Avenger, #826. You post a glib narrow minded view representing older interpretations of ‘human error’.
If the crew were confused or exhibited poor CRM then what were the confusing factors, which aspects of CRM were weak, why? We might assume (with some confidence based on human nature) that the crew did not deliberately choose to fly into the sea, thus there could have been a decision making issue, a decision to continue, a decision of who and how to fly the aircraft, and when or not to go-around.
Until we have an understanding of the crews belief we cannot conclude anything for sure – gazumped how do you know that there was “unshakeable belief that the aircraft was going to land successfully”, the aircraft didn’t; thus a conclusion might be that there was a mistaken belief – the crew and your reasoning.
If we are to learn from these unfortunate accidents then the contributing factors have to be identified, even with speculation in advance of an official report there could be much to learn.
If windshear was a factor then perhaps predictive (radar) systems might not detect a rapidly forming or descending microburst (NB. AFAIR neither EGPWS nor FMS predicts W/S #827).
Crew’s might not experience ‘vague feelings of unease’ or interpret turbulence or change of speed with an impending threat; possibly factors of training or experience.
Why does disconnecting the autopilot from a VNAV approach apparently destabilize the flight path – are crews aware of this, what should be done.
There are lots of good points to be learnt, whether they apply to this event or not; our job is to learn and improve knowledge and hopefully be able to recall this and apply it when the occasion arises.