Originally Posted by
RetiredF4
Yes, if you are a pilot and understand, how flying itself and management of abnormal situations is functioning in a human brain in opposition to an electronic gadget designed by engineers you will find some points to think over.
How many times can I say this before it sinks in?
The Airbus FBW system was designed by a group that included pilots.
And you're not answering my question. You've got five failure modes there (you didn't bold "In the event of temporary loss of all electrical control:"), only one of which is relevant to the case we're discussing and two or three of which have never actually cropped up on the line. From a piloting perspective the only significant failure mode that requires a different approach entirely is mechanical reversion (i.e USE MAN PITCH TRIM ONLY).
Knowing what those modes mean is helpful, but not crucial. The only thing that *is* crucial is that outside Normal Law there are no protections and as such, more care must be taken.
And the main problem is, that you normally donīt fly that thing, but you are being flown while monitoring. Except when the sh*t hits the fan.
That is the fault of the industry, not the aircraft or the systems. Even then what you're saying is untrue unless you take a very narrow definition of "flying" to mean direct surface connection, because the flight computers will do whatever the pilot requests them to do (just as their electro-mechanical/hydraulic predecessors did) unless what the pilot requests threatens to damage the aircraft.
Originally Posted by
Lyman
Early on, we were treated to closeup video of short finals/touchdown, the pilots handling were stirring mayonnaise, yet the camera outside showed the a/c virtually on rails...
Most of the Airbus FBW pilots on here were of the opinion that the pilot in that video overcooked it slightly.
So I am calling mayonnaise on Bonin, him thinking the ship would smooth his "whatever" stickwork into grease....e thought he was in NORMAL, and made no effort to modify his stick inputs to a LAW of which he was unaware?
Law has nothing to do with it - even with traditional controls, high-altitude manual flight requires a defter touch than that at lower altitudes, because there's less air resistance.
it took the a/c some seconds to load up, and go up, and once committed, no one would be able to suss her attitude.
You mean apart from the whacking great ADI indicator in front of both pilots?
... so I conclude his handling bespoke NORMAL, with protections.
It doesn't matter. Even in Normal Law those inputs would have been excessive. The crucial factor is that he didn't have any high-altitude manual handling experience.
A pilot who does not know whether he is climbing, at Mach .80, or descending, has not thought of which LAW obtains.
Nor should he or she have to - that's the whole point of the law degradation process.
So my case is based on: STARTLE (agree?), loss of scan, loss of orientation, and loss of the plot.....
But will you still feel the same way tomorrow?
This in the first twenty seconds, max. The only save was for the PNF to take over. He didn't.
...
The PNF and later the Captain, failed, for whatever combination of reasons, to ... fly the plane.
The PNF seems to have been entirely reliant on explicit instructions from the Captain to delineate his responsibilities. Once the Captain was there, rather that suggesting that he had an idea of what was going on, the PNF waited for the Captain to perform his own troubleshooting, which wasted valuable time.
I suspect that even after the final report is published, the HF and psychology experts are going to be poring over this one for decades - in terms of complexity it is every bit as morbidly fascinating as KLM4805.