It seems some posters on here have been drinking from the fountain of knowledge and some only gargled!:E

Air rabbit, Owain G et al

Some interesting info so thanks for posting. My vague recollection, from reading Flight International, was that the problem was largely due to the large rudder input and then the REVERSAL afterwards.

From a line pilot's point of view I cannot envisage why the FO would have thought that such inputs were necessary. No criticism implied- there but for the grace of God etc. Apart from an engine out condition one doesn't touch the rudder in normal ops. In an extreme attitude then of course it may help to use rudder eg high bank angle with the nose yawing below the horizon. I believe that was an example described in the American Airlines training video that I watched many years ago. That video was withdrawn from use after this crash.

The other point I have had drummed into me is that with powered flying controls one has to treat such controls with more than a little respect. With the rudder in particular it is a large control surface and and so, for example, when cycling the rudder on the pre take off checks one must do so SLOWLY!

BBK

I failed too. Teldorserious, could you help please?

Thank you dsc810. Gliders are not built like airlines, but it is assumed that starting piloting with gliders is a good pedagogy. As we learnt it from AA587 wrong practices were accepted from the community of pilots. We have to change now these false ideas built on very particular situations with bad solutions : Learjet dutch roll or communication between glider and trailer. Didactic is important. We know that in critical situation our brain is regressing to what we learn first. How we learn to fly is still coming out after thousands of hours. What you have well learnt in initial formation is for ever. Poor initial training is expensive and dangerous.It is important to give effect to accident reports like AA587 in pedagogy.

This has been an interesting and illuminating discussion, thanks!

Quote from tdracer:
I don't seem to recall anyone ever claiming that the 707 airframe wasn't robust.

When I did my base training with AA at DFW in 1975, I was surprised that no attempt was made to demonstrate dutch roll characteristics and recovery at altitude, even though the a/c was equipped with only one yaw damper. (BTW, I'm not suggesting that dutch roll recovery by the pilot would involve any use of rudder.) Four years earlier, my VC10 conversion had included several full demonstrations (up to about 40 degrees of bank) and recovery. The VC10 has(d) 3 independent rudders, each with a yaw damper.
One possible interpretation was that the a/c was not inclined to serious dutch roll at altitude - we all know that it would on the approach. On reflection, I'm wondering if the B707 airframe, specifically the vertical surfaces, may have been merely adequate for the regs? Has anyone got a copy of Davies to hand?

Quote from flarepilot:
that plane would still be flying if it had a rudder limiter based upon speed. at low speed full throw, at higher speeds less throw.

It has precisely that.

Clandestino,
Your posts are always well-informed, but could I respectfully suggest that you might resist the temptation to nit-pick the statements of those posters with whom you are broadly in agreement, and that you allow for the context in which they are made, and the audience? I'm sure you don't mean to sound arrogant..

Quote from Teldoserious:
Must be fun to get an Airbus type...

Indeed it is! The OP has made some unsupportable assertions (not all as cliched as the above), and in doing so has done us readers a favour by provoking the authoritative contributions of AirRabbit, Owain, and some others.

Teldorserious, out of interest what A/C ratings do you hold or have held?

I gather you've never flown an Airbus, what about Boeing?

He has no ratings what so ever. He has appeared under numerous identities over the years, and always wears his ignorance on his sleeve.

john smith

just about every plane I can think of in the transport catagory has the admonishment that the pilots operating handbook assumes the pilot is an experienced and knowledgeable pilot and does not hand hold the novice.


shutting down the engines in cruise is generally recognized as contrary to maintaining altitude

scanning the instruments is generally recognized as a requirement for precise flying...

an experienced pilot knows that.


but what us experienced pilots didn't know was that using the rudder in a certain way WOULD CAUSE THE PLANE TO FALL APART.

I am of the generation that had it drilled into them BY THE FAA in its approved methods that structural failure wouldn't occur below certain speeds with full control throw.

(not unless their was previous damage to the plane)


In the modern cockpit there are some odd placcards...one I mentioned was about limiting control throw to HALF above 40,000'

many of us go to work every day in planes that have placcards saying you can't do a Catagory 2 ILS without proper training and operating equipment...now most of us still think that one is out of place...BUT ITS STILL THERE.

A placcard describes something unusual about the airplane, it is akin to the pilots operating handbook. Even a short paragraph in the airbus POH saying not to screw with the rudder would have done the trick

OF COURSE, who would buy an airplane that has a placcard or POH statement like: IF YOU SCREW WITH THE RUDDER THE PLANE WILL< REPEAT WILL< FALL APARt and KILL EVERYONE.

sorry john smith...if you knew the plane had this problem and you didn't tell all us other pilots, shame on you.

I just wish I had copies of all those books and tests I've used over the years with statements about what controls, what speeds, etc , all FAA approved.

DP Davies would have had something to say.

Oh, by the way...getting ''locked into " wake turbulence is something we train for...and it can be a bitch ...can't anyone conceive that the wake was bad enough to start a whole cycle of events that ended up showing the weakness of this plane?


I am reminded that there was a dissenting opinion from an NTSB member about the probable cause and the tail had previous , unknown or unreported damage.

makes one think

oh, and an A310 lost a piece of its rudder on a different flight...hmmmm

makes one think

I think that it is a separate issue. Losing a rudder is a lot different than losing the entire fin which happens to take the rudder with it.

The partial rudder thing was due to some sort of disbonding I believe.

Maybe that's the reason there is no placard in transport airplanes explaining use of rudder?

HN, exactly.

Isn't it somewhat tiresome discussing stuff with two different SSG personae in one thread?

Since the trolls(Brian and Denti) have jumped in, the thread derailed. I'm out.

If the Airbus can't take a rudder back and forth, so be it. You can believe that all planes are like this, completely nullifying what us pilots do every day in training, in x winds, in single engine ops, or day to day flying, stepping on the rudders all day long, back and forth, at all sorts of speeds. Still here.

The sad part is some still havn't learned the lessons from this accident. Boeing has pages of text on what is, or isn't, acceptable rudder input.

"If you believe that all planes are like this" - we're talking about commercial jet aircraft. What a/c are you talking about? What commercial jet a/c can you swing the rudder back and forth, stop to stop, with no cause for concern?

The lesson is that Airbus made a crappy tail that couldn't be inspected for fatigue, and it did fall apart under conditions that many of us have exceeded in other aircraft, by orders of magnitude, every day in turbulance, upset recoveries, and normal training regimens.

I've got a technical question (this being the Tech Log forum) that I haven't seen addressed, even in the NTSB report.

What sequence of effects or factors led to AA587 then losing control and crashing after losing the vertical stabilizer?

Yeah, yeah. I know. "Duh! The tail fell off!" Except that aircraft (even large jets) have lost their vertical stabilizers without subsequently crashing: http://www.murdoconline.net/wordpres...52-no-vert.jpg

I'm figuring the probable effects were:

- abrupt shift to a nose-down cg with the loss of the stabilizer's weight from the tail.
- "snap yaw" in reaction to the loss of the rudder's yaw force in the opposite direction.

BTW - I don't mean to imply that the AA crew could have saved the aircraft. They had little altitude or time and were in an already confusing situation. The crew of the B-52 pictured were test pilots intentionally trying to identify structural weaknesses. So they were at a safe altitude, and expecting (more or less) something to break.

AFAIR, according to tests after the AA587 accident the "crappy Airbus tail" did exceed the required and specified strength specifications by a considerable margin. A more valid point of Airbus-related criticism was the sensitive reaction of the rudder pedals, translating even very small pedal movements into considerable rudder deflections at higher speeds. And indeed there was apparently some widespread confusion regarding the limits represented by Va, including the FAA itself.* But all this has nothing to do with the tailfin strength or accessibility of the Airbus vertical stabilizer.

* Cited source: AA587: The Perils of Flying by the Book | Flying Magazine

@pattern: the B52 on the picture still has an (albeit small) remaining piece of vertical fin that stabilizes the airplane with regard to yawing movements. Without any fin and the resulting weathervaning tendency, AFAIK no airplane can be controlled in flight.

@pattern

I'm not sure about this but I believe that the B52 didn't have any hydraulics in the vertical stabiliser - I'm sure someone here will correct me if I am wrong there.
When AA587 lost its fin it also lost all hydraulics since it was supplied by all three systems. Consequently there was no aerodynamic control of any sort available whereas, if I am right, the B52 at least had elevators and ailerons.

What we have here is a failure to communicate
 

DEAR JOHN SMITH...

I see the problem...you don't understand that thousands of properly certificated FAA approved pilots did NOT KNOW THAT STOMPING ON THE RUDDER would cause the plane to fall apart.

thousands of us learned that if you were at or below Va and applied full control movement the plane would not fall apart.

it was on countless examinations and in FAA literature of the time.

Even while flying other planes, that had rudder LIMITATIONS and rudder limiters WE (PILOTS) were required by the FAA and OUR AIRLINES to memorize and display knowledge of limits imposed by design of the plane we were flying.

I can still explain how the rudder limiter system works on douglas systems and boeing systems and that if the limiter system fails we have to KNOW NOT TO USE TOO MUCH RUDDER ABOVE CERTAIN SPEEDS.


What the properly certified airline, training program, and pilots who were involved in the A300 inflight breakup DIDN'T know then is what you claim to have known all along.

Hence my advice about a placcard or a POH write up.


I'm glad you know...but I didn't and a whole airline didn't and the FAA didn't know.

But you knew.

yeah, right.

now we know...and maybe that's why the airbus is so junior at some airlines.

Here is a cut and paste out of a Boeing 777 AFM:

I'm pretty sure all Boeing AFMs have that same statement. It didn't use to be there - it's addition was in direct response to the A300 AA587 crash.

Do you really need a placard to remind pilots not to do something that the AFM tells them not to do?