First the disclaimer... I've spent the better part of my adult life as ATC, so for me this is more a matter of historical perspective than it is any sort of current systems knowledge.
Two things did, however, come to mind. First is the fact that I had the pleasure of experiencing, as crew, total electrical failure on a four-engined military jet transport, mid-Pacific, in the middle of the night, some 30 years ago. Sometimes it goes to hell all at once.
Second, when this thread first started I had a flashback about the United 727 out of LAX in 1969. In that I went on to be a controller at the LA Tracon some years later, the story was familiar to me. Of course, it never hurts to return to the
primary materials when thinking about this stuff...
In short, the airframe had been operating for three days (42 hours) with the number 3 generator inop and placarded. Just after takeoff, the crew got a fire warning on the number 1 engine, told the departure controller that they had shut down number 1, and requested a return to the airport. Five seconds later they lost power from the number 2 generator. Count 'em--that's all three generators gone. The standby electrical system either failed or was not activated. By my math, total electrical failure occurred 90 seconds after VR. Of course, it was dark out and the weather sucked--low ceiling and vis with rain and apparently a fog bank just waiting for them. It took six weeks for the NTSB to recover the CVR. It was on the bottom with the rest of the aircraft in 1,000 feet of water. Nobody survived.
Now, I'll be the first to point out that this is NOT the situation originally set out in this thread... this happened a hundred years ago in a type of aircraft that almost nobody in this discussion still flies, this situation didn't require a decision before V1, etc. But consider that this was a new aircraft in 1969 (16 months old with less than 1100 hours total time), properly equipped with things like a battery/standby electrical system which was supposed to give the crew enough juice to get back to the airport in IMC, and a third guy sitting sideways in front of a panel in the cockpit babysitting the whole mess. What's more, the accident happened on departure from what was probably one of the best-equipped airports in the world (navaids, ATC, etc) in an area where terrain wasn't an immediate concern.
I'm not advocating for stopping or not stopping--I don't really have a dog in this fight. I'm just sticking my nose in this thread to suggest that such a scenario today is still not "well beyond the realms of likelihood." And Mike--bless you man, you tend to write some of the most sensible things I read--you've got to entertain the idea that there remains the possibility that them big, beautiful MFDs are going to be dark. Yeah, I know, systems evolve and airframes today are tremendously more reliable than a new 727 was in '69. Still, I'm sure that Capt. in '69 also had confidence in the standby system powering his steam gauges. The confidence in this case just doesn't sit well with me.
Sorry about the lengthy babble... Oddly, I'm still not certain I made the point I was trying to make. Perhaps someone will give me a hand. And again, I do understand that the 1969 scenerio simply doesn't fit the "total elecrical failure before V1" question, even if you move the engine fire indication to a point before V1. That's not why I brought it up.
Am I making sense?
Dave