@
JuggleDan
Thus, I certainly understand the BEA report as saying that all position reports were sent from the a/c nominal route, up to and including the last message at 0210.
I am not about to dispute your technical French definition of the meaning attributed by the BEA to the 02:10:34 final position, but I'd rather suggest the BEA has further data surrounding the basic position, e.g. flight level etc.. which they have deemed not relevant or desirable to be released in the Preliminary Report. In this respect, I submit that the AAIB and NTSB concurred with the wording used both in the prime report and the translated English version.
The 10 minute position reports (irrespective of interpretations around the accuracy associated with them) placed the a/c on the UN873 center line and the GS over the last 10 minutes (463KT) was only 1 knot slower than the earlier period. Without the FDR/CVR, '
when' the deviation occurred is purely speculative.
mm43