Peterwelch, the Captain was not a "bonehead", nor was he one to generate an atmosphere of intimidation in the flight deck, he was most likely in total overload and task saturation and/or task fixation, as I pointed out in a previous post we can replicate such conditions in the simulator with multipe distractions/mechanical failures. The final factor which doomed this flight was an EXPERIENCED non -asertive F/O, just the final factor in this sad affair, note I said "experienced" F/O, the USA has just increased the hours required to be in the right seat in a scheduled airline, Canada has just gone the other direction and introduced the "Multi Crew Lic",I can see problems with crewmembers ignoring an F/O who isnt allowed fly an aircraft solo and has less than a hundred hours of flight time, but that another discusion altogether.