Thanks for the link, John.
HN39;
I won't forget our early exchange on stall AoA and later also with Owain Glyndwr the effects of Mach on AoA and buffet thresholds. The discussion had a profound effect on my understanding of my airplane and of high altitude-high speed flight and AF447 specifically. I would recommend to anyone wanting to know more from those that really do know their stuff, to find this and other exchanges with these two posters.
Re, "...would it help prevent future accidents if sophisticated Flight Guidance and Aircraft Monitoring systems, having rejected three sources of airspeed information as unreliable, and 'knowing' conditions such as configuration, weight and altitude, provide more specific information as to the appropriate response?"
I need to think about it! ;-) Along with weight, altitude & configuration it would use AoA and perhaps also have a running historical window, say the last five or ten minutes, of all relevant indications upon which to build a "safe envelope"? Just thinking out loud.
Initially I think, Yes, it would help, but in the Birgenair and Aeroperu cases more than here. Reason I say this is, most of the Airbus UAS events lost airspeed indication for less than two minutes and from what can be gleaned from the Interim Report 2, those crews affected didn't seem to do anything but wait.
Because pilots are creatures of visual, auditory and tactile habit, a switching to a "novel" presentation may present as much surprise as the event itself and take a moment to get used to...which means it also has to be trained in the sim, which available time these days is heavily-challenged already.
But the Birgenair/Aeroperu cases are completely different and I think such a system/presentation would have saved the aircraft.
Organfreak;
I didn't watch the BBC series, preferring the BEA work plus some discussions on the side. I prefer original sources to anything that will perhaps innocently but most assuredly have a point of view and a theory and must keep an audience entertained to be economically viable. I avoid the "Discovery Channel" kind of stuff for this reason. The needs of television are not those of good investigations because such work is enormously detailed and for most, tedious and certainly would not entertain. "The story" is certainly interesting and I can see where those not familiar with the event would enjoy learning about it though and getting enough from such programming to ask further questions.
Not sure if the BBC was showing Vasquez's work, but it showed up early here and was an enormous help in understanding the weather aircraft transiting the ITCZ deal with on a regular basis.