Upon closer examination, I have discovered some very interesting information about the supposed
rational decision made that night over Germany by the TU-154 captain to descend in accordance with ATC instruction but contrary to the TCAS RA.
According to PBL, Bseiker and Bernd this was a rational decision by the TU-154 captain because ATC had advised mistakenly of traffic at 2 o'clock while the crew saw lights and TCAS traffic at 10 O'clock. Better to descend visually around the known and seen traffic at 10 o'clock than risking a collision with the reported yet unseen traffic at 2 O'clock(which in fact did not exist) according to these three posters from the University at Bielfeld.
This was the statement made by PBL in post # 20...
Please read my analysis of the decision problem presented to the Bakshirian crew at Überlingen. They were faced with an "intruder" at 10 o'clock which they saw, and an unknown conflict at 2 o'clock which they didn't see, and for which they had an advisory to descend (that is, he was at or above their altitude).
What would you do? Climb towards another conflicting aircraft that you don't see but ATC does? Or avoid him, descend towards an aircraft that you do see, and hope to avoid him using visual means?
Please give some good reasons for your answer that will also be good reasons for any other pilot in this situation.
In fact, the decision to ignore the RA was made at least 10 seconds before they were even given this mistaken traffic location by ATC. When this erronous information was given to the Tupolev crew they were already descending at 2,000 feet per minute. So when the decision was made to ignore the RA, in the Tupolev crew's mind there was only one other aircraft out there. See this link(pg 3) as well as final report.
http://www.casa.gov.au/fsa/2004/aug/22-29.pdf
Interestingly, the Tupolev crew in the very last seconds realized the TCAS was correct and did finally follow his RA with control column fully back and thrust levers fully forward. Much too late.
So then the logic comes out that TCAS was at fault because if it wasn't installed the accident would not have happened instead of the logical thought process of...If the equipment was used as designed and regulations followed, this accident would not have happened.
Of course these posters are not responding to several pertinant questions I have asked. This really makes me wonder about the accuracy of all posts and studies done by this group.