The crew of AF447 cannot have seen the latest Stall recovery advice from earlier this year (2011).
PF was/ had been a glider pilot, who must have had many winch launches, when the cable would have been attached under his seat. On releasing from a winch launch the glider would have been nose up, to get the maximum height from that launch and would have required the elevators to put the nose down to retain flying speed.
Someone reduced the thrust to Flight Idle for a few seconds on AF447 and the pitch dropped slightly but the SS stayed towards NU. Then TOGA was reselected.The stall was not recognised.
Would an old fashioned Rate of Climb instrument have helped them to realise that they were going DOWN... before the "passing 10,000 Feet..." on the CVR... The needle's change of direction might be clearer than a tape type display whizzing up/ down, too rapidly to be read. (Think what it might have looked like in Inches !)
Some of the French aircraft that I flew had metric instruments. We just flew the appropriate numbers.
Last edited by Linktrained; 24th August 2011 at 12:39.