Originally Posted by
casper64
Just FLY the damn chopper! Or have we forgotten how???
I don't think anybody would argue with that sentiment, but it's not clear what phase of this event you're referring to? With the AP drop out, then of course fly the aircraft and follow the QRH - which says decouple the Flight Director, ergo fly manually with the remaining AP in ATT mode. Some OEMs say try to attain VMC, but I see the 139 QRH does not say this. It does say that if the other AP fails then reduce speed to below 100 KIAS, and it also says (in the limitations section) that taking the APs out of ATT mode in IMC is forbidden.
However, from what we are now learning, the captain used the electrical gangbar, which turned off all the electrics at once, leaving them with no flight instruments at all, and a totally unstabilised aircraft which, I am sure, would have rapidly departed normal flight. Even with the electrics restored immediately, there would not have been any usable attitude information for quite some time, so the concept of "just flying the damn aircraft" is a bit moot at this point - they were essentially passengers. I think that had the cloud base (which gave them the visual references for recovery) been much lower this would have been a fatal accident.
Caverton has a Level D FFS in their main base, so it would be very interesting to see how this event looks like replicated in there! No doubt, that has already happened....