Originally Posted by
seagull967
What is theta-dot? Aren't you confusing Airbus and Boeing? Fly-by-wire laws on a Boeing do not change during the flare maneuver and you stay in "normal".
For any fly-by-wire aircraft it is very dangerous to look at flight controls deflections and draw conclusions on pilot inputs, as the fly-by-wire will make many corrections to make the aircraft do what it "thinks" the pilot wants to do. In general you have to think of "path" more than actual corrections when making inputs to the control yoke.
However, (I was told this during training long time ago) and this is very true for the 777 and cause of many PIO especially in the roll during the flare: once yoke deflections become "large", the FBW system thinks the pilot really needs the aircraft to move quickly and will react in a much more "direct" way, hence much bigger aircraft reaction to stick inputs. As
FlyingRoland mentions, in turbulent weather, when the pilot makes too big corrections, the FBW will also kick in hard to make the aircraft roll quickly in the desired direction. There are many videos out there of PIO on the 777 during the flare in gusty weather.
In this specific video, if the elevator is deflecting downwards that much, it is indeed probably an overcorrection of the pilot. And yes, the best is to simply let go of the control yoke (if correctly trimmed).