How much margin is there?
xkoote: in your opinion, assuming the MD-82 briefly was successfully airborne for a few seconds and lets assume the worst possible scenario of a bit of overweight, 10kt of tail wind and slightly low air density, a bit understimated V2, a bit oversteep take-off angle and a bit reduced thrust (i.e. slightly bad quality fuel).
How unlikely is that the plane could have stalled even with nothing else "wrong" (i.e. no major loss of engine power)? Does major engine malfunction is basically a necessity for take-off failure or the above conditions coupled with say a 2º error on Flaps deploiment be enough to potentially stall the plane?
If the anwer is what I think, then too many highly speculative scenarios open up on why the pilot could have decided to try to land rather than continue to fly.
Also, goverment officials said they saw the airport security tape and the accident was recorded but that they couldn't see anything significant (for them, speaking as politicians and not aviation experts) on the causes of the accident. In other words, they implied they couldn't see any obvious physical reason for the accident (no major explosions or large fires or obvious engine malfunctions or large errors on operation prior to the abrupt landing, of course, from whatever small image could be seen from the potentially far away camera). They didn't mention the reported wing touchng the floor when it "abruptly landed". They even said something to the bold extend of: "The accident was recorded but there is nothing on the tape as to why the accident happened"
Last edited by justme69; 23rd Aug 2008 at 06:24.