Spanair accident at Madrid

[Rananim]

Eyewitness accounts of the aircraft's excessive takeoff run and difficulty getting airborne are easily explained and its not power.
-aircraft was heavy
-hot high airport
-tailwind
-improved climb speed-take less flap to improve climb grad-reduced thrust/flex and improved climb shouldnt go together btw-

Now thats for a normal situation,an aircraft that is properly configured.It will use more of the runway to achieve a higher V2 speed and better climb gradient.But once it reaches Vr,it will rotate and lift off at 6-8 deg body angle(MD-80) and climb away normally.For an aircraft that has no flaps/slats extended,it will rotate until 11 degreees body angle,struggle into the air,and if the stall recovery procedure is not flown,it will stall on leaving ground effect.On this aircraft,the stick pusher/autoslats would not have been active because the slats were retracted.Also,it is quite possible that a flex takeoff was performed although this is naughty.Some operators deliberately use opt flap to improve engine life(actually youre supposed to use it when you're climb limited)..ie..take very low flap,still reduce thrust by about 20% and end up having ridiculously high Vr and unnecesssary RTO risks.It should be done with full TO thrust.

Could some Mad Dog pilot please be kind enough to say what signs you might get when this bird is stuck in air mode whilst on the ground?Anything you can think of like parking brake/antiskid/autobrake anomalies..so far the reports indicate that the pilots mentioned only this probe heater to the engineer which sevenstrokeroll has already confirmed is heated whilst airborne but not on ground.They would have armed the autobrake in the T.O position as part of pre-flight.If the aircraft was in the air mode,presumably a disarm light would have alerted them and this may have been mentioned to the engineer as well.