Hi,
BOAC
It may be losing sight of the wood for the trees but to dismiss the aircraft entering turbulent weather as not relevant is rather rash. The fact that the crew of AF447 did not deviate round the weather front is highly significant. The pitot tube failure whilst clearly a contributory factor is not the reason for the accident. The actions of the flight crew in responding to the situation and entering the thunderstorm when others didn't are. I am not assigning any value judgment here just noting an event.
I wonder if it's not a usual behavior of some AF pilots to take at least some risks on this route or in case of similar weather ..
It's to remind sometime after the AF447 disaster .. the AF445 "mayday" on same route and somewhat same conditions ...
It was "apparently" a non event (but passengers were strongly shacked for longtime .. big turbulences) and plane lost altitude (was it stalling also ??) .. but happy end ..... in this case .
We will never know what really happened as the recorders were erased or datas convienently missing ...
Another "cas d'école" .........
The BEA has launched an investigation on December 1, the day after the landing of the aircraft. Air France has meant that when the plane had already left for Bangalore in India and the data of the CVR black boxes, the registration of trade in the cockpit, and the FDR, the parameters of the flight had been "crushed". A plane is indeed equipped with two black boxes supposed to provide the data theft. The recording of conversations is valid only four hours while recording parameters covers 25 hours. After a return trip to India, there remained nothing more data.
The companies also have an additional record the QAR to the use of its maintenance crews. Unable to access both legal records, the BEA has requested that the QAR was not available. "Air France has said that the data were not recorded because of poor formatting," says spokesman BEA. For its part, Air France states that "the QAR was recovered on November 30 just before noon and the time to send it and realize that it was a virgin, the plane had left for Bangalore."
However, investigators have recently received a new report, more substantial than the first. "He has no objective value, says one close to the investigation. The company has just said it was a non-event and that the crew may have overreacted. " The side of the BEA, the investigators' regret not having the AF445 flight data that could shed new light on what occurred on Flight 447. "
Go figure .......