Vis,
One of the reasons that no one could replicate souix city has to do with the limitations of similulators. When ever anyone jumps in a sim the invariable complaint is that it is too pitch sensitive. That is because the sim can't replicated the feel of pitch (increased or decreased G loading) It can replicate the feel of acceleration and deceleeration, uncordinated flight and some turbulence.
But the phugoid occilations that Soiux city experienced are beyond the ability of any sim to simulate, and that had a huge part in the handling of the aircraft.
Also, Soiux City DID NOT CARTWHEEL. They struck the runway pretty much wings level at about 1200 feet per minute. What then happened is that the wing broke (A Known problem with the DC-10/md-11 failure mode is that the wing breaks, look the the EWR Fedex MD-11, Memphis MD-10, Hongkong MD-11, When one wing breaks then the other wing flips the remaining parts of the aircraft over)
Cheers
Wino