I don't always agree with 411A...but I recognize that he is an experienced pilot.
American has rarely impressed me with piloting skills. Some exceptions might be pilots acquired through mergers like Air cal or TWA or such. American has claimed that Lindbergh was one of their own...through a very big stretch of the imagination.
I know at least one pilot hired At American who lied in his log book...oh well.
I've seen something that can only be called over confidence...thinking that something can be ''salvaged'' but the skills are rusty or lacking.
With new planes, higher automation, it seems to me that hand flying skills are gone. straight down a runway, pull up...autopilot on...hand fly about 2 mins.
automation to the outer marker and hand fly to the runway...2 or 3 minutes.
So, on a 5 hour flight, you get 5 minutes of real flying. Maybe 20 hand flying hours a year for a 1000 hour year. Think about that.
Dragging wing tips, overshooting a runway...this all sounds like an old pro who has lost his touch on the stick.
There is a difference between these AA crashes and the USAIR stuff in the 90's.
All of the AA stuff is happening in the same part of flying/phase of flight...landing.
All of the USAIR stuff was pretty unique accidents...aborted takeoff after V1 at LGA...rudder trim out of wack or is it whack?
cleared to land at LAX with another plane on the runway at night...obvious ATC error.
Microburst/windshear at CLT ( I was there watching the smoke come up)...atc involved with that one too, though the pilots were flaky on this too.
And the rudder deal at PIT...'nuff said on that one.
I hadn't heard about southwest diverting from Reno to Oakland...I know both places like the back of my hand...odd stuff.