Petercwelch, #2712,
Your question assumes that the manufacturing design was the primary (dominant) or the only cause. It’s generally accepted that accidents are the culmination of many factors, requiring the interaction of significant issues.
Accidents arise from the unforeseen and often unforeseeable concatenation (linking) of diverse events, each one necessary, but singularly insufficient. J Reason.
A significant issue in this accident appears to be human behaviour; the crew’s perception and choice of action. Unfortunately we are unable to establish all of the facts of these matters. In our speculation we are exposed to hindsight bias due to the nature and timing of available information.
Some may argue that the Airbus FBW control system design degrades awareness, but the system is used without mishap in everyday operations by Airbus crews.
Have they adapted, have alternative control skills, or use other aspects for awareness? What are these features; were they absent in this accident or did the crew fail to use them? These have yet to be established.
The design of the stall warning system might be similarly cited, but other aircraft, although not engineered in the same way, have similar systems and meet the same requirements – including preventing unwanted warnings in other areas of the flight envelope, e.g. use system inhibits.
A more plausible view is that none of the crew identified the stall condition; again an aspect of awareness, and also, if the all speed displays are unavailable, an aspect which does not appear to differ with aircraft type.
If as suggested in the report, the PF had a mental goal of achieving an erroneous pitch attitude – that required for flight without airspeed, but which did not apply at high altitude, this also is invariant with aircraft type.
Conversely it is arguable that the resultant stall condition could have been recovered with a stick-push system, as fitted to many aircraft – noting that a controlled flight manoeuvre into the stall (as with AF447) would provide similar trim conditions irrespective of aircraft type. But again we can only speculate how the crew might have reacted to a stick push with regard to their mental model of the situation. We would hope that a forced stall recovery would ‘jolt’ the mindset, but evidence from other accidents (Colgan) suggests otherwise.
Many safety activities depend on asking questions, but the key issue is to ask the right question because in most cases, then the answer is obvious.
This accident has posed many questions and the industry is having difficulty in identifying ‘the right one’. This will not involve the aircraft type alone, but include the limits of human performance, the operational situation, organisation, and the system at larger in which we live; it will involve what we do and encounter every day, and how we do it.