Why they searched for AF447
They could have stopped looking for the plane, filed it all under "unproven cause" and let the insurers pay out.
The reason why such a huge amount of effort was expended to find the plane was that 50 million french people including politicians and company CEOs fly in those aircraft, and are piloted by guys trained in those procedures, and that it was really felt by everyone involved that an answer however unpleasant was better than no answer.
And in fact there is one thing gained from the report. The certainty that in addition to some updates to airspeed measurement instruments, it will be necessary to update pilot training so that civilian pilots have at least minimal flying skills.
The debate about confusing computer messages, sidesticks etc will probably take a few more accidents to progress usefully, I fear.
Last edited by edmundronald; 16th Jul 2012 at 19:41.