Pushing over
Uncle Fred: Even having been exposed to some of this training in the sim, I did not really take to heart what it would be like to have to push over that much at 350 and how I would have to be fighting what the body would be telling me not to do.
I know that there are a LOT of posts as far (agreement is probably going too far) to the effect that pushing forward, or anything less than 1.00 positive G is uncomfortable, unfamiliar, non-intuitive, and frowned on by management. But it seems pretty clear that poster opinion agrees that there are circumstances when this action is appropriate and even immediately mandatory. I am excluding airframe G limits and myriad possible computer interactions for the moment because they mislead away from the fact that lack of comfort or familiarity is not an excuse for not doing the right thing. If one never ever practices something but thinks that carrying it around in their head as an intellectual trivia bit for use in extreme situations will be sufficient come the need, the success rate is going to be low. And while evident on the FDR might be plain, they why probably will not at all be apparent on the CVR.
I can't help recalling that WWII German pilots got themselves out of a lot of nasty spots by pushing over. Written about later the reason given was always German fuel injection capability over American carburetor incapability. But it wasn't mentioned that pushing also offered the benefit of being counter-intuitive.
I've spent enough time hanging from a seat harness to know that in addition to the brain drain resulting from all the mixed up kinesthetic sensations, control touch inverted or even in positive sub 1 G can be a much different animal depending on one's personal fright curve. And I have to say that the idea that there are a lot of airline pilots out there with no clue whatever about those differences is alarming if not frightening. Granted it may never be needed, but the idea that a pilot would not only be uncomfortable but also would have no interest in pursuing those aspects of flight outside the norm is not preparedness norm I have always expected of pilots who got farther along than I did. Intellectual knowledge does not equal knowledge plus kinesthetic preparedness. What one is not willing to explore out of cautious self preservation will eventually come as a pop quiz in less than propitious circumstances.