Svarin : [...] Then why the aircraft that can be flown by "concierges" ? [...]
DozyWannabe : these controversial things 24 years ago [...] this should be disregarded [...] Airbus have acknowledged this [...]
I am genuinely interested to read when, how, in what terms, such official acknowledgement took place. I may not have met the right people. I am genuinely interested in acquiring a better opinion.
Many engineers over this forum state that they take their craft seriously. I do not doubt it for an instant. Then, please, do not doubt that airline pilots do take their craft with deadly seriousness, too. They are the ones who do the dying along with all those poor trusting souls. I have never ever met an airline pilot whom I could call a "chancer", and I tend to be rather unforgiving on this matter.
Again, all modern airliners are safe and reliable. This is not the issue.
Whether the following particular item is relevant to the current accident or not, I do not know. But this is again a philosophy issue.
As an example of claimed authority that should come with responsibility :
A respectable manufacturer states in its FCOM, regarding some "flight envelope protection" system (in Normal law) : "a progressive nose-up demand is introduced [by the FBW system]. The pilot cannot override this demand." (bolding mine) Such authority cannot be separated from the associated responsibility.
Given this authority that the aircraft (or its design team) claims, any investigation should start by examining in its most intimate detail what the FBW system did, and whether it was done by design, intent or mistake. Then we can start looking at how the system interacted with the pilots, and then look for blunders on their part. In that order, as the manufacturer obviously decided it itself !
And back to our subject matter, three ACARS maintenance messages are related to Flight Controls, affecting its Fly-By-Wire core components :
EFCS1 X2,EFCS2X,,,,,,,FCPC2 (2CE2) / WRG:ADIRU1 BUS ADR1-2 TO FCPC2,HARD
F/CTL PRIM 1 FAULT
F/CTL SEC 1 FAULT
(bolding mine)
That makes three components out of five affected in one way or another. This is largely enough to deeply inquire first about Flight Controls. Given the authority claimed by this system, anything less would be dishonest.