Danny, that accident has always worried me, though not because of autopilots but rather because of Air France, BEA (the French Air Accident Investigator), and DGAC (the French CAA) practice. When the article says:-
The clogging of that particular probe design was a known issue on certain Airbus models, and though it occurred only under rare high-altitude conditions and had never led to an accident, it was considered to be serious enough that Air France had decided to replace the probes with ones of an improved design
It implies that this was down to Air France to counter. It was not, it was down to DGAC. It was a fundamental airworthiness problem that should have been resolved urgently (even your Vengeance would have been compromised if the pitot head or static vent was partially blocked and thus giving spurious airspeed readings!). It was not. This is not the first Air France accident that has blamed the pilots when the basic cause was lack of airworthiness (eg the A320 at Mulhouse in June 1988).
I don't know where this article got its facts from, but the general trend to concentrate on the two pilots rather than the Air Regulator is par for the course for BEA.
Modern aircraft are certainly complicated, whether in autopilot or not. I remember my first experiences of a glass cockpit were a real challenge. However, nothing really changes, you still have to be ahead of what is happening or you will merely follow it to its inevitable conclusion.
I notice that Bonin, the PF, is stated as having acquired almost 3000 hours on modern FBW (Airbus?) aircraft. I would hardly call that minimal. If he behaved in the erratic way stated, having taken control when the autopilot dropped out, I would suggest that is a comment on Air France pilot training whose product he was. Similarly a company, that merely keeps another pilot (Robert) just in flying practice so he can sit in an office rather than the RHS learning his trade to assume the LHS, has rather missed the point of running an airline.
Sorry for this off-piste rant, but airworthiness is a bit of a thing with me, as some here might have noticed!
