Just a comment on most of the posts here so far. They border on an abusive chat room in tone. At the risk of being labelled an old fart who should leave the air safety and accident analysis to ones better qualified, a reminder is not out of place that this is a pro pilot website with rules and standards. Unless a post is pertinent, informed and adds to the debate it is better to shut up and leave it to those really in the know, or at the very least able to speculate with some credence.
When that brand new Legacy over Brazil en route the US took a wing off that Gol B737 in the cruise, head to head, it was a year or two before the in depth, highly informed analysis came out. If you want to read up on this , get this brilliant book , "Inside the Sky", and read the final chapter -
William Langewiesche's life has been deeply intertwined with the idea and act of flying. Fifty years ago his father, a test pilot, wrote Stick and Rudder, a text still considered by many to be the bible of aerial navigation. Langewiesche himself learned to fly while still a child. Now he shares his pilot's-eye view of flight with those of us who take flight for granted--exploring the inner world of a sky that remains as exotic and revealing as the most foreign destination.
Langewiesche tells us how flight happens--what the pilot sees, thinks, and feels. His description is not merely about speed and conquest. It takes the form of a deliberate climb, leading at low altitude first over a new view of a home, and then higher, into the solitude of the cockpit, through violent storms and ocean nights, and on to unexpected places in the mind.
In Langewiesche's hands it becomes clear, at the close of this first century of flight, how profoundly our vision has been altered by our liberation from the ground. And we understand how, when we look around, we may find ourselves reflected in the grace and turbulence of a human sky.
There are numerous similar examples that those seeking an education in air accident investigation might well study closely.