Good to see some re-hash of a few things, especially the AoA issues.
As far as the pilot actions go, all we know is what the pilot did. Until we all join him in that hootch bar in the sky to get his version of the story, we shall never know.
OG made a good point many threads ago, and recently referenced. AoA "protections" depend upon mach bias once getting on up there WRT mach. Otherwise, the raw AoA is a very good indication of your state. Due to our mission requirements, and our relaxed static stability ( actually negative) until 0.95M, that bias was essential. Doze and I have talked about this and seem to agree that our implementation was necessary. So I return to the discarding of AoA once the dynamic pressure inputs to the FCS were deemed invalid. And BTW, on my emergency landing HUD tape you will note that all the displayed data went to zero when I reached 60 knots. Hmmmm. Of course, we were in "direct law" once we had WOW.
I have always been puzzled looking at the FCOM re: flight control laws, as it appears the system abandons many limits and such at the very first reversion mode. Roll control is one biggie, as 'bird points out with possible PIO for the first 30 seconds or so. And then there's the AoA protection, and sensed dynamic pressure be damned. Too easy to see if the vanes are cranking out good data. Our system had the traditional vanes ( conical sensors with slots), but we also had a "hemispherical" probe that had holes drilled all over it. That probe had its own heater and provided differential pressures to the "air data convertor", which then provided inputs to the FCS and an output for display and to our weapon/nav systems.
It is too easy to retain roll control laws other than the 33 degree limit and such, and simply command zero roll rate if the pilot is not moving the stick left or right. just look at the Thunderbird solo pilot's routines and note that the sucker rolls inverted and then the jet just stops rolling with no wing rock. It was easy, as all you had to do was relax pressure. Since there is no completely "direct law" except for the elevator/THS, this implementation has always puzzled me.
I wonder if the original test pilots ever went thru all the reversion laws where they could "fail" the air data or this data or...... I also wonder if they ever asked to fly in our little jet and see what we had using a similar test setup.
too long, but I had to get this off my chest.