Originally Posted by
Lemurian
Is this a chain of events (meaning related ? ) ?
Is it indicative of a major electrical fault ? of crew manipulation ? a fire ? or a structural failure ?
If the order of the faults is accurate, is the A/P disconnect from the pilots or is it an indication of an extreme upset or one or several sensors ?
Your opinions, please.
I would say, yes, related faults. I'd also not put any great store by the precise sequencing within each 'group' - ACARS may be reporting them in its own order, not necessarily the order that they actually occurred in. (If two systems were to fail simultaneously, for example, ACARS still has to send one first.)
I wouldn't be surprised if a common cause for the 0210Z "group" was found to be an airspeed system malfunction. I believe that airspeed miscompares will drop the aircraft into Alt Law, kick the AT and AP off and would not be surprised if the rudder limiter posts a fault when it loses the airspeed data needed to schedule the limit with speed (I know of a case where that would happen on another type).
That only leaves the various 'FLAG' messages - and I'd imagine that faulty/failing air data sources would be flagged on the PFDs, so that could be the source too - and the TCAS message. I would not be at all surprised to find that an airdata error could trigger a TCAS fault of some kind.