Originally Posted by majaam
I don't know if it has been discussed but could someone tell me what kind of seat-of-the-pants sensation the pilots were experiencing with a 10,000fpm descent? Were they in a "steady-state" of some kind with no sensations?
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very interesting. So after an initial sense of falling (after they reached their crazy 7,000fpm climb to FL375 and then dropped at -10,00fpm) with the inflexion attributed perhaps to turbulence, I take it to mean that there were no sensations?
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And the captain could walk back from his rest bunk and into the cockpit while all this was going on?
Pretty incredible.
I think if he had been capt. for as long as he had been, sensations of climb and turbulence don't disturb you. Not even the sensation of descent -- it seems.
In the most parts of the world it is covered in high-school level physics and physiology. Human beings are not equipped with velocity sensing devices, they can only feel acceleration, be it linear or angular, with the senses being adjusted to ground based, visually assisted, bipedal mode of locomotion, therefore they are easily fooled while flying. The AF447 crew was faced with incredibly docile behaviour of the aeroplane as it stopped flying: no extreme banks, no extreme pitches, no high-rate turns and acceleration was unremarkable in all three axes. Once again: there is no such a thing as the feeling of speed, only acceleration.
Originally Posted by SDFlyer
If you look at the FDR output, any conscious pilot would surely have been aware of the remarkable accelerations associated with the zoom climb and initial descent.
There is nothing remarkable about single 1.6 G peak followed by gently mushing around 1G with occasional trips to 0.8 and 1.2. Nothing spectacular in lateral or longitudinal acceleration graphs either.
Originally Posted by Machinbird
So 60 degrees of bank may have felt like ~25 degrees of lean.
Of what interest, bar as means to recognize and prevent the unsavoury effects of illusions on flightpath, are feelings of attitude to a pilot flying solely by reference to his instruments?
Originally Posted by Machinbird
Since the aircraft was generating much less lift with the wings and much more drag with the fuselage (a form of lift since their velocity vector was pointed very downward)
There are no such thing as pure lift and pure drag. Lift is the component of total aerodynamic force perpendicular to the path of the object moving through the gaseous medium, drag is parallel to it. Therefore, aerodynamic drag can not be considered to be form of aerodynamic lift, at least not in euclidean geometry.
Originally Posted by bellfrybat
If it did, they totally disregarded what the instruments were telling them or the displays must have been faulty.
First case is not entirely without precedent; capt of Birgenair 301 put his faith in the only non-working instrument on the flightdeck so stalled 757 on climb-out with predictable and fatal result. Second case has, so far, no proper leg to stand on. All recorded faults are consistent with three pitots being blocked and nothing more. By the time the aeroplane reached her apogee and started her final descent, left and stby ASI were showing consistent and correct speed readouts.
It's up to BEA to determine what is more plausible.
Originally Posted by Mac the Knife
May I suggest that faulty or not, by the time the stall was established the displays were so covered with multicoloured scrolling, flashing and changing alert-messages that it was hard to decipher anything at all, let alone the attitude indicator?
You may but don't expect to be taken seriously. What has been deciphered from DFDR shows that only changes affecting the PFD were loss of airspeed information. and replacing the bank and pitch protection marks ( green "=" sign) with yellow crosses indicating the loss of protection. There are no scrolling or flashing messages on Airbus, per design and multicolored is reserved for ECAM only. Granted, ECAM would be hard to decipher with apparent multitude of procedures but ECAM actions are supposed to come into play only when the flightpath is safe, which actually never happened once climb was initiated.
Originally Posted by YorkshireTyke
One of my early instructors expressed the opinion that one became 50% less intelligent as soon as the wheels left the ground
Wildly optimistic. I'd put it north of 67%. That's why ground instructors of old insisted of knowing as much as is possible about aeroplanes and flying: it was in hope that if we remembered the number of nuts& bolts holding our aeroplane together on ground, we could remember at least the part of it that would someday make the difference between safe return and smoking hole while we are airborne.
Originally Posted by YorkshireTyke
The technical investigation is over, but is is not time to now start the CRM, Human Factors, investigation into what made them act in the way they did ?
No. It is very safe bet that it began as soon as the BEA was noted of the missing aeroplane so it is probable underway, if not nearing its goal.
Originally Posted by Organfreak
There was nothing "plain and simple" about this accident.
When one considers how the other crews managed the extremely similar problems in plain & simple way, one has to agree with you.
Originally Posted by Highlander959
If they also knew that aircraft ahead of them had made course and altitude alterations to go round these serious weather issues, why was the same decision not made by this crew?
The crew of the AF447 avoided the weather and never penetrated the storm cell. Notion that they did is at odds with officially published third interim report. It would be useful for further discussion to find out what are the sources for it.
Originally Posted by captplaystation
Having read the other thread, a long way back, about instrument failure/false overspeed indications & uncommanded climb by the "wonder-plane", to counter this , perhaps uncharitable summary, & being something of a "Frog/Airbus conspiracy believer", I am willing to be disproved (indeed more willing than most)
If you are referring to Turkish vs Canada 3000 rapid climb and TCAS RA over the North Atlantic, the official word from AAIB is very clear: it wasn't overspeed protection that caused the climb, it was crew's massive overreaction to overspeed protection, followed by massive underreaction to twitchy high AoA protection - which was desensitized since. Somehow, some of the posters on the thread were stunningly incapable of comprehending the AAIB report.
If you are referring to something else, please accept my apologies for making an assumption too many and please provide the reference to the occurence mentioned.
Originally Posted by 40 and 80
I would be interested to know if this flight has been duplicated in the simulator and what reliable flight instruments and standby flight instruments the pilots had available to them to manually fly with on this black over water night flight?
It was. Everything was working bar speed and that returned to normal pretty soon. As for black, overwater, night flights, I'll have to borrow the phrase from Mick Jagger: "It just happens every day".
Originally Posted by Gretchenfrage
It takes a thorough training, a decent amount of experience and a serene assessment to occupy the left hand seat.
All it takes is rapid expansion and all the decency & serenity gets thrown out the window. If there's empty seat on the left and pilot with ATPL and at least 21 year of age on the right, that's enough, no matter what country so no mounting the first world high horses, please.