Manual flying skills need to be maintained but lets recognise that not everyone is capable of reverting to them under all circumstances.
But, isn't that a serious indictment on those responsible for type rating training - especially on the proliferation of low hour "cadets" going directly into the second in command positions of responsibility? Any pilot, type rated and certified to command competency, (in other words completed a course of simulator instruction and has the type on his licence) should be capable of seamlessly reverting from automatics to manual flight regardless of aircraft type. These sort of incidents would suggest this is not a training imperative.
