In my opinion, the origin of this, and several other US accidents, lies in the method of training here in the USA and not necessarily in the content.
Specifically: a great deal of the training is done by rote parrot-fashion Air Training Command-esque "repeat after me...".
There is very little " let's check your understanding of that ".
This is highly controversial stuff, for which there are great implications involving cost and time, both for the student and the employer. I know many of my colleagues will be saying to themselves right now " ooooh hang on a minute mate, let's not open up that can of worms. Trouble....". But it has to be said, and it has to be dealt with.
For example: I went through that same Maneuvering programme, and from previous experience had
no doubt whatsoever that the
co-ordinated, circumspect use of rudder was for very low speed already-departed situations, and then
only as a last resort. I had always, from previous experience and aerodynamic theory, been aware of the limitations on a fin during divergent phugoid motions, especially at high speeds. This is well documented from the early days of jet transport, not to mention DP Davies' excellent works. I was also acutely aware of the limits on engine pylon mounts during yawing/pitching.
Now here's the bit that's going to get me in trouble, but if it saves someones a$$ in the future:
Many times I have been through training here in the US and some of my fellow students have come out with a blank stare on their faces. Nobody checks their understanding of the material being taught, and by that I mean in depth on the theory and principles behind it. It's just "repeat to me the Memory Items" so that we can fill in a square.
The US ATP exam is a prime example.
In many cases that I have seen, students are trying to make a basically unsupervised leap from slower, smaller, domestic equipment to widebody international, in many cases to end up sitting on reserve lacking practice instead of being supervised and intimately challenged by senior staff, such as happens at BA, CX, etc.
International training is just ticking the boxes. Look around at US pilots' reputations in overseas ops if you are in denial.
The union tries extremely hard to prevent extra examination, or no-notice sim-checks.
I am absolutely convinced that a prime factor in this accident is that the pilot involved may have left training having misunderstood the ideas being presented, but there was no in-depth examination of his understanding of the material. WINO has put this more eloquently than I, in a posting many months ago.
Most of us were quite clear that the rudder was still a footrest at high speed, but 100% of us? Without follow-up in-depth checking, who knows?
Despite the dire straits of the US airline industry, it needs to get it's standards in order, and pay less attention to "filling squares" and graduating gradesheets.
