einhverfr;
That might have come from misreading one of my posts. My point though was that the A330 is designed for the flight controls to degrade gracefully, not that the aircraft loses control gracefully. This is why one has 5 flight control laws (Normal, ALT1, ALT2, Abnormal Attitude, and Direct), so that when some protections are not available due to technical reasons, or are not applicable to the current aircraft state, whatever protections are applicable and technically available are used.
Of course gross upsets can happen very fast. I am hoping that folks did not take from my post that I was saying this couldn't happen....
Yes, I did mis-recall/misunderstand that statement, thank you. I was thinking more of "mass" of an airframe than I was of software design; to me, both outcomes, (degradation of control laws, LOC) are however, "graceful" in the sense that they happen relatively slowly and, in the case of loss of control of a large (widebody) airliner,
insidiously, which is all I meant. Thanks again for correcting the impression.