I have to say it's fascinating watching current, type rated pilots educating each other about more and more subtle interactions, reversions and sub-modes. I wish I knew that much about the aircraft I fly; *gets books out*.
I've just read the initial report and one section really hit home:
The investigations initial findings brought to light the fact that there is a great diversity in the description made by operators of non-revenue flights, in the context that they establish for the preparation and execution of these flights, and in the selection and training of pilots. This diversity, along with the almost total absence of any indications or standards on non-revenue flights, can also lead to more or less improvising the performance of tests or to performing tests or checks in inappropriate parts of airspace and/or during flight phases with a high workload.
I remember being called off standby as P2 for an air test, very early on in my flying career. Great! I thought, that looks like fun... I won't bore with all the details but we did end up in an emergency descent with a door warning and both packs and one engine failed at one point (never got it relit). I had a fair amount of difficulty keeping up with the schedule and assumed the other pilot & engineers knew what they were doing. With the benefit of hindsight, I'm not sure that they did, especially as we had about 30 hangers-on in the back along for a 'jolly'.
I really don't need to add that I had no training in and no adequate briefing for what we were attempting.
When you see:
The Captain said “I think we will have to do the slow flight probably later” then “Or we do it on the way to Frankfurt or I even skip it”.
followed by:
the Captain disengaged the autopilot. He said “Down below the clouds so you want what?” The New Zealand pilot answered “We need to go slow with err recovery from… recovery”.
you can almost feel the time/commercial pressure building up. You end up in the absurd situation that you attempt something as a group that you would have never attempted as an individual. Two line pilots with an "observer" going where test pilots fear to tread. I'm very sympathetic as I've been there.
The precise technical details of what actually went wrong, near the end, will come out eventually. What stands out, I feel, is that when test pilots "test" something, they are prepared for that test to fail: indeed, they are *expecting* it to fail in a multitude of ways, having extensively researched the subject. For a normal line crew to be put into a situation like this is, at the very least, regrettable - in the extreme it could be argued it was a form of corporate manslaughter...