Originally Posted by
Smilin_Ed
If there were fuel trapped in the center tank and if the fuel quantity system were working properly, the crew should have noticed it.
Also the AAIB should have noticed, and their report says:
The total fuel on board was indicating 10,500kg, which was distributed almost equally between the left and right main fuel tanks
They also reported significant fuel spill at the crash site, so we know it didn't run completely dry (regardless of indicated quantity). Also, the engines continued to get some fuel (report implies they rolled back to somewhere above flight idle and stayed there).
The quoted report on fuel scavenge failure is very interesting though, not least because it matches some of the previous speculation here on fuel scavenge + ice.