Originally Posted by
Old Boeing Driver
"The television channel cited experts who suggested that by turning off the autopilot, the pilots were trying to pull the plane back to a horizontal position. But at that moment, a stabilizing fin at the jet’s tail was switched on.
With the fin activated, “the elevator is no longer working and the plane practically does not react to the pilot’s control panel,” the report said. The channel suggested that the pilot could have accidentally hit the button that activated the fin because of his reported “chronic fatigue.”"
Can anyone translate this English into English?
What could they be talking about..."a stabilizing fin at the jet’s tail"?
Edit: maybe the HS?
Never mind the b...s. These are the same people who translated the alleged CVR materials into Russian, had actors read them out against the background of artificially added "airplane-y" noises, and put the whole thing on air.
Here's my translation of what was said... for what it's worth (=nothing).
"[After the decision to go around], the aircraft was gaining altitude for 40 seconds. Not yet having reached the planned FL, the captain disconnected the autopilot for reasons unknown - possibly because of wind shear (which they call "atmospheric scissors")/rough air. It is then that the plane began to dive.
After the autopilot disconnect the captain tried to coax the plane into horizontal flight, but after the dive has begun, THE VERTICAL STABILIZER SWITCHED ON. As a result, "руль" [the word they use is actually more like "steering wheel", not "elevator" - which is what they must have meant?] stopped functioning, and the crew didn't have enough time to figure out what happened.
Why the stabilizer turned on is unclear. It is activated with a button which the pilots call "knuppel". In rough air, the captain, while switching to manual flight, might have accidentally touched it without noticing, due to chronic fatigue. Otherwise, it's some unheard of surprise on part of flight automation systems."
