Lonewolf 50:
At risk of sounding vastly ignorant, might a design strategy for such a capability, thrust reversers, tie in to a weight-on-wheels switch?
Boeing's engineers went one level deeper. As I understand it, the logic as designed was :
WoW + Thrust reverser deployed -> Stow LE Flaps (to protect them from jet blast or foreign object damage)
No WoW for whatever reason -> Deploy LE Flaps as commanded
From the original post (emphasis mine):
The slats stayed retracted for a total of 23s. They started to redeploy 7s after the jet became airborne - as the undercarriage was retracting, at a height of 56ft - and were fully extended 9s later. The stick-shaker, which had activated intermittently over a 15s interval, stopped as the airspeed rose to 186kt.
Congrats to the crew, who kept a level head and did the right thing.