AF447

[Hyperveloce]

Originally Posted by grizzled

I have seen nothing that would rule out a thermally driven rapid climb in the given circumstances, whereas I have certainly seen many posts on this thread suggesting scenarios that are either highly implausible, or even ruled out.

Hi there !
Please, could you be more specific about the either implausible or ruled out scenarii ? On my own, I have seen nothing that would acertain this hypothesis of a rapid climb at FL470 (why 470 ? no overshoot in the thermal imagery, no updraft detected by the AMDAR flight 25 mn before on the same track but at FL325 - wind 3.6m/s@319° , conditions can change rapidly though). Does this scenario of a rapid climb even require a freezing event of the Pitots ? It would be a coincidence ? (Pitot freezing event & rapid/uncontrolable climb)
Where would be the problem with a possible unfortunate reaction of the automation and the pilots in a context of unreliable airspeeds, misleading signals in the cockpit and in the procedures, high workload and false stall alarms, that would have degraded the aerodynamic margin at high altitude and rendered the plane highly vulnerable to turbulence even moderated ? (loss of control in a Learjet fashion)
Jeff