I thought the brilliance of the AB technology was sold (for the 'concierge', of course) on the fact that it was 'unstallable' in normal flight?
???? Not seen that anywhere? It has some "protections", but it is not flown in an everyday manner so as to get anywhere near them.
It is not beyond the bounds of your HF arena for a 'normal' crew to screw up the speeds with 2 out of 3 sensors screwed
Please re-read my post. This takes a number of "improbable events" in sequence, much as most design decisions are based on. What use would a "AoA disagree" message have been (and difficult, since in fact the 2 main AoAs were frozen at ~the same value)? We don't fly on AoA. So the QRH/ECAM says "take care, do not stall". Errr... I don't tend to plan to anyway
Yes - a consideration that perhaps it could have degraded to Altn Law, for a Direct Law landing, but if every little sensor reporting a problem gets this level of degradation, then few Airliners woudl despatch (B machines included).
What then? 'Check GW?. I'm not sure many of us would have reacted correctly to that warning
Please re-read the
context of that. A
Test Crew should have understood that a "Check GW" message, together with Alpha Displays being clearly incorrect.
Give a crew the necessary information
They had it:
- Do not perform this Test unless you are Qualified e.g. Test Crew.
- Do not perform this test below 12000'
- The speed output of this test is in the table below. Do not go below it - if the desired result is not occurring, recover to normal flight and consider what is happening.
- Consider what you are testing, why you are testing it, and what will happen if it goes wrong...
Let's make sure EVERYONE understands the system is not 'perfect'.
This goes for all 'modern' aviation technology, by the way
Exactly, and this applies to the Airbus as much as any aircraft. The approach and lead up to this accident shows exactly that... and I for one think in this accident Airbus (as a company) come out well... all the wanring signs were there (who could do the test, the altitude, the confidentiality agreements before handing over the schedules etc.)
Bottom line - see where the Report's Safety Recs lie. Largely HF. I still have trouble seeing this as an Airbus specific issue. It is so similar to the 2 EJ 737 incidents, where the outcome was different purely due to the adherence to basic safety precautions.
NoD