Mbird:
If I was to run off a runway at speed, I think I'd be doing it with full aft stick and trying to keep the pointy end up in the air. The pitch down into the divot at the end of the runway is strange and almost certainly caused the high percentage of fatalities among the crew.
it would be interesting to see some good photographs of the runway and its relationship to that freeway. It seems it was like they ran into a building, so to speak.
Very, very sad. Unlike some of the airline crashes we have discussed here over time it seems like with this one perhaps the crew was sucked in by various circumstances.