Lookout, UAV Ian has arrived!
Originally Posted by Ian W
I put it to you that both of these questions are answered by 'the designers believed that they had to design the TOGA button for less than competent crews'.
I hope you say that tongue-in-cheek. Obviously, with today's high performance engines, having a crew (PF then the PNF) mucking around trying to manually, accurately set a thrust (takeoff, GA or whatever) is silly. Hence a button that will do that (and in Boeings, incorporating at two-step thrust limit for GAs to help prevent gross overshoots, as has happened on Scarebusses). So as far as I can see, there is a useful purpose for TOGA buttons.
The issue here is only that it doesn't work in a Bolter situation. On other jets, it does. If you don't practice bolters regularly, then you're probably going to stuff one up if you have to do one, especially if, as in this case, you have plenty of IAS and things look OK on the ASI and therefore haul it back into the air. So much to do in so little time, with the aeroplane reacting, initially, as you would expect. And because you never handfly, you've lost that seat-of-the-pants sinking feeling when the bottom starts to drop out of it with no thrust on. Throw in a distracting radio call and...