Presumptions
Quote from takata:
"I'm feeling that we are now back to the early discussions we had two years back, right after the crash."
I have some sympathy with his point, but what do we know now that we didn't on 3/7/2009, after publication of BEA interim Report No 1? Not a lot, really, although much of the evidence therein has now been supported by images from the debris field. People speculate on why the crew allowed the aeroplane to fly into a Cb, but we have as yet no proof that it did, let alone that they did. We don't even have proof that weather was contributory; beyond the probability of pitot icing, which many previous flights had coped with. The only big news is that the sea-level impact took place within 5nm of the LKP.
Also find myself in some agreement with BOAC. Perhaps we are all anxious to record our ideas while we have the chance. But there does seem – in the anticipation of an imminent, recorder-led denouement to this mystery – to be some risky polarisation of theories. Here are a couple more.
Quote from tubby linton:
"Imagine the folowing scenario- pitots ice up generating an overspeed. The aircraft pitches up and the athr retards the power to idle..."
Cannot speak for Tubby, but most of you seem still to be convinced that pitot icing always leads to the related ASI over-reading. This presumption is unfounded. Further homework is called for.
Quote from Machinbird:
"We do have actual wreckage this time and it is located very close to LKP pretty much down track, and indicating a descent to the water that almost guarantees it was in a deep stall."
Another equally dodgy assumption, apparently encouraged by the idea of over-reading ASIs. If I happen to fly my airplane over the final-approach fix at 10,000ft, and subsequently land on the same sea-level runway, does that mean that I had to lose the height in 4 or 5 miles?
Chris