A0283, Perhaps I am not following your thinking? For the A320/A330/A340 types flight control actions/inputs are protection-limited in Normal Law and would not cause the loss of the THS or the breakup of the aircraft. If the aircraft were in Direct Law with no such protections, it is doubtful that swift, full deflections of the sidestick would break anything

I started a google map to chart the debris field. Based on the satellite images and images from the ground this is what i have so far...

https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?m...Vw&usp=sharing

A0283, yes, but "overpowering" the AP would be unvoluntary disconnection as well, i.e. not a normal way to disconnect the AP. But I guess it should not take more than 2-3 sec (I don't know the exact force required, it might be in some maintenance manual, but I don't think its more than 3 or 5 kg or so...). But as others have said I think it highly impropable that some sort of incapacitation caused this event (the aircraft is protected,in normal law the only way to overload the aircraft would be through massive rudder inputs...)

Kulverstukas, you have the sides wrong paired, left/right right/left.

Good one Kulverstukas - that's exactly what I've just been looking at. I'm guessing the 'slots' in the tail cone separation ring(?) are where the lug of the HS centre projects out behind the pivot point. Looks like the lower tail cone attaching lugs have pulled off the end of their respective box sections and an area of frame is also missing directly above on each side - where the HS pivot mounting attaches to the lower part of the fuselage.

Also - looking just above the slot on the left side of the APU cone (where the top attachment of the HS pivot mounting would have been) is that just normal muck, or does that look like an area of sooting on an otherwise apparently fire-free tail cone?

It doesn't matter. What I want to points is: top panel and holes for center pivots seems undamaged. Low panels bears marks of hit from lower pinions.

It means that HS leading edge travels down much more than allowed.

The lower end of the HS pivot mounting let go on both sides and swang backward on the top attachment, breaking the frame of the separation ring and prising the APU cone away at the bottom?

Otherwise - the HS pivot somehow spontaneously let go both sides (appears totally implausible), dropped below the slot and the attaching lugs of the HS centre punched into the APU separation ring, to the same effect?

'Pinions' - that's the word I was looking for.

Flo
 

"I noted that they landed with 17 tons of fuel remaining on on flight"

Can you point us to where you see 17t ? That doesn't make any sense to me.

HS issues
 

#2036 (permalink)

Just a guess- since we have not seen any HS "wing box " structure- it may well be that that structure along with jackscrew attach points and surrounding ' skin' has been removed from wreckage after cutting out the CVR and FDR to show what was found almost immediately.

That would include some of the attach lugs/points of the VS- which are missing. Some of the 'damage' to surrounding parts as seen may be the result of on the ground dissassembly to load on truck(s)

As to the obvious bending -breaking off of HS near simultaneous- IMO that could be caused by simply breaking the jackscrew or its follower or its mounting points allowing the HS to move towards being a flat plate to the airstream. - evidenced by the pulling down of the fuselage ret he tension unzipping of upper half forward of the AFT door. What caused the breaking or slippage is yet to be determined

Until either the HS ' wing box ' is found or revealed- we have probably reached the practical end of a reasonable analysis-

Explosive residue is another issue re initiation and where in aircraft :ugh:

Oldchina, On the extracts from the Flightlog - its on Flightlog page 26916...it says remained 17000kgs, Uplift 3930kgs giving a total of 20930...it seems to be a case of rather extreme tankering as the rotation was DME-LED-SSH...

JDD1 the CVR and FDR are located in the cabin above the rear lavatory not under the HS.

Vnav path, thats one with 7 tons (the accident flight), but there is also a previous one with 17t, page 26916...

Looking back at photos of the Hudson plane, it's possible to see pins connecting the two plates of the HS pivot hanger above and below. So once the HS goes down beyond a certain angle, the bottom edges of its attaching lugs will collide with the lower pins, twisting the hangers backward at the lower end and pushing onto the APU separation ring.

Between the twisting of the hangers and the sudden downforce/drag, you suddenly have a whole lot of forces at work on the tail of the aircraft.

matkat

http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/5...ml#post9171991

other than a bomb...
 

A central fuel tank explosion would cause an instantaneous catastrophic failure. I don't know how that can be ruled out given what we know, although I presume actions taken after TWA800 have reduced its low likelihood to even lower.

@mudman

I have been doing something similar in Google earth, a couple of comments

- i think that you last reliable location position could be added to, the flight radar 24 S data indicates that at 04:13:15 the data starts going nuts, at 30.149689 34.178521, this is just to the west of the debris field and could indicate the start of 'event'.
- based in photos i think that the most east wreckage (30.168889, 34.171111) is an engine. This is determined from emergency vehicles and other wreckage in the background of photos.

The desert is hardly a hostile topography for finding such pieces.