There was some discussion on the 'Trim Running' aural alert, but no conclusion. Some thought it was 'ding ding' bell. (Never heard of that for trim.) Others a traditional 'trim clacker' - which you'd sort of expect. Someone suggested a clacker that only sounded after several seconds of trim running. Whatever it is, it should be on the CVR - but what is it?

With reference to old-style instruments, flat-panel displays are getting bigger and bigger. No reason the same style cannot be used digitally to mimic the sacred six.

Going to draw some flak here I know, but I have a couple of questions for you guys.

FYI, I am a just a lesser human being (a concerned SLF) but I believe I have a right to expect that aircraft manufacturers and airline operators ensure that I can travel from A to B safely and with confidence.

So here we go:

1.If the AP/AT systems on an A330 are designed to disengage when they encounter a situation which they cannot handle, and immediately hand over control to the pilots in the 'driving' seats, why are the pilots not provided with a clear reason, or at least a good indication, as to why the AP/AT disengaged in the first place?

2.Are the automated systems on this aircraft, or on any other commercial passenger aircraft, capable of detecting a potentially dangerous TS storm system, and of warning the pilots of their aircraft's proximity to the same?
If not, why not?

3.Has the logic of initiating automated multiple audio/visual alarms simultaneously in the cockpit of an aircraft in flight and in a critical situation, and the phsycological effect of this on the pilots in that situation, ever been thoroughly studied and investigated?
If not, why not?

Despite the recovery of the CVR/FDR, the fact is that nobody will ever really know the cause of this accident. CVR/FDR will provide clues but, as with so many serious aircraft accidents, nobody will ever know for sure what really happened here.

But I would suggest that the interface between aircraft automation and consequent human reaction to that automation, played a large part in this particular tragedy.

'Nuff said...

I believe we just pointed out that a digital display does not have the same attention getting power of the actual instrument.

With regard to the standby instruments, why would we want to do that?:ugh:
Diversity of instrument types can have benefits.
We have already put the 'sacred six' on the PFD, haven't we?

I will bet they will know for sure to the level that you can bet your life on the result.
If you want absolute certainty, then you are living in the wrong world.:rolleyes:

The full CVR will be made avail to the general public sooner or later unfortunately( or fortunately depending on which side you're on ). In the days of I-phones which can record anonymously anything 10m around you and given the media attention this perticular accidents has, it is only a matter of time I would say.
In anycase, since there will be a trial, the defence lawyers in France will have access to it and will reveal it, as they did in the Quiberon, Brest and Pau accidents, and then it will be including all the" sterile cockpit" discussions. Trial of the crew by Media. The New Zealand and Canadian approach is far superior.

X-plane stall recovery
 

I'm not sure if I got it right - What was the THS-trim at stable stalled configuration - Was auto trim working?\ - how slow was trim reduced - what was elevator position during trim-reducing. What was trim when recovered?
What about Center of gravity - and the posterior trim tank?

Those procedures should be tried in an full-scale simulator (actually I'm kind of shocked that there seems to be no developed procedure to recover from fully developed semi-flat stalls - and even little practice in simulator) - -

in accidents like these, there is a lot of contributing factors, neither of which could have caused the crash by itself. However, when they are working together, there is a synergy between them which leads to disaster. Even if you had all the data, you might not be able to tell if the crash really happened because of flying into thunderstorms, or pitot tube design, or lacking AoA indication, or excessive unmanageable automation, or lack of high speed, high altitude stall training/awareness, or something else. You can pick one reason and call it THE reason, but others will disagree with you, and the argument will just go on endlessly.

No, I think the point was the format of the instruments as seen on a PFD is not as conducive to subconscious comprehension. Drum vs radial scale, etc. Whether this is steam-driven, crt or LCD doesn't really matter.

Some of the bizjet & GA panels are doing a pretty impressive job with this these days. I'm sure it's an area that will continue to be refined.

Not sure what this has to do with standby instruments. They will still be there.

ATC

" The New Zealand and Canadian approach is far superior."

You sure about that sport??

The NZ police are pretty damned quick to subpoena the CVR to assist them in prosecuting crews if there is an accident. The is not what the CVR is designed for IMHO.

I already said there can be no certainty in this situation.

Are you 100% certain in your statements?

Well said! :D

100% certain doesn't relate to this world. Quantum mechanics and Schroedinger's Cat experiment tell us that.

JamesT73J,
Start at post #1395 and read forward.
That big screen may not be all it is cracked up to be, no matter what you put on it.

To an extent, are we training pilots too much?

Yes, of course, we need SOPs and structures, not to mention stall/upset training, in order to ensure safe flight but my perception is that rigid adherence to procedures is causing a mind set which sometimes doesn't perceive what is really going on.

The first step in solving any problem is the acquisition of the correct information - like, hey guys, something is happening here but what?

Some offshoots of the interminable discussion (guilty) are worthy to discuss in the absence of anything new. For instance, a question.

The "Yoke" is a LIE. No, it int. It may be a totem, but it is critical to team management. With the advent of the Sidestick, two questions became legend.

"What's it doing?" and, more critically, "What's HE doing". Neither is totally without basis, obviously.

A basic format poser. What is the Airbus Philosophy? How does it differ from other flight deck formats?

At a very basic level, the a/c is sold as single pilot, imo. Hence the lack of criticality of the PNF. Including the commander, who needs to supervise?

The Airbus cockpit has two managers, the others a manager and a manager/ Leader. In the case of 447, with Captain on deck, there were three managers.

A leader tells his men what he wants; a manager does also, but then he explains how to do it. The QRH, coms, and checklist can be done auto, either audio visual, or audio.

What's lost is the Command, and imaginative leadership.

With the a/c as a priori commander, there is no chain.

Training, Experience, Confidence, Imagination.

The PF needs to be able, Life or Death, to understand immediately what's happening. Not consult, scan, or be patient, waiting to be told, or worse, to guess.

Bonehead decision making is all around us, and any philosophy that does not support "ahead of the aircraft" 'gots', for whatever reason, will kill people.
Pilot on board or no.......

Reversed elevator effect?
 

I'm not a pilot but in my work I get in contact with different aspects of flying.

There are so many posts in this thread that I can't read them all. If what I'm going to suggest is mentioned in an earlier post I apologize.

Although I have never heard of it I wonder if in a stall situation like this there could be a phenomenon that could be characterized as a reversed elevator effect?

In this stall COP is obviously forward of COG and the horizontal tail must then produce a high lift (upwards) to rotate the nose downwards.

Hypothesis goes as follows. At this aoa plus the extra 13 degrees of the HT, the HT is probably stalled too. Pushing the sidestick forwards in order to gain more lift on the HT will move the trailing edge flap (elevator) of the HT downwards thereby giving the chord line of the HT a higher aoa resulting in deeper stall of the HT and less lift generated by it.

Pulling the sidestick backwards moves the trailing edge flap of HT upwards giving the chord line less aoa, a milder stall, more lift on the HT and a lower pitch angle.

If this hypothesis holds it could explain why the PF pulled on the sidestick

THS and elevator position
 

@Gorry:

You are homing in on a theory several of us have expoused.

The Airbus stabilizer and elevators are "conventional". i.e. no all moving stabilizer as all military fighters have had since early 1950's. So your question is a good one.

Besides that, nobody here has yet to explain how the THS moves with respect to stick commands. I am waiting.

respectfully, from an old dinosaur FBW pilot

Here's more old fashioned stuff. When the conventional a/c (Airbus) is flying, it gets to change what is effectively the Angle of Incidence of the HS, but when the a/c gives it back to the pilot, he has to control Pitch with what amount essentially to "Trim Tabs" (elevators). Manually "trimming" the big slabs back to a neutral AOI, is an extra task to get the a/c back to "neutral".

No?

Gums, "Besides that, nobody here has yet to explain how the THS moves with respect to stick commands. I am waiting."

I’ll try:
THS moves by itself, both in normal or alternate law, in order to relief the force needed on the stick. If you pull it will move up, silently, and the other way around.
It freezes in certain conditions, below 100’ radio altitude, less than 0.5 G, high speed protection. It has limitations in its range, when AOA protection is active, bank greater than 33º, more than1.3 G, etc.
In direct law, it must be moved manually, by the manual pitch trim wheel, as the message Man Pitch Trim Only is shown on the PFD.
In normal and alternate law, it feels as if the aircraft is always in trim, as it should be. As thrust varies, both in A/P or manual flight, the trim wheel can be seen moving, compensating.
In direct law its manual use is easy, as the wheel does not move much, to go through the whole range.
AF447 should have had it available and moving forward if the stick had been moved forward and kept there for a certain time. It is necessary to force the nose down, and keep it there, if THS is already much too nose up and the aircraft pitching up.

To some extent, when having been handed back an aircraft under these conditions, especially in (!) heavy turbulence, wouldn't just flying it on trim-wheel in pitch be a) possible b) a good idea c) having first 'clocked' its position at handback.

This is presumably an elevator control setup that is = = stick fixed in pitch when flown hands-off? Yes?

I would think so, yes. Trim seems to be a counter intuitive goal when attempting a recovery? It implies that any particular attitude is worthy of continued authority. I am trying to picture how Trim is important to upset recovery (or in turbulence), when it is critical for allowing aft cg flight for economy? If relied upon to sustain an otherwise laborious aspect (tail 'lift'), it is also reliable to command inputs that may be more transient than the word 'trim' would imply?

Especially in recovery, as here with 447, with the THS NU within one degree of max., if the turbulence changes, one is stuck with max trim up. Just trying to get a handle on the challenges the PF was facing at a/p loss.

This discussion of analog vs digital instruments makes me realize that relatively soon there will be very few of us left who learned to fly with round dials and moving "hands" and "lines". The others will have no idea of what we are talking about.

I was recently shocked to find that a 12 year old neighbor, whose mother is a financial analyst and father is a lawyer, is unsure of the time when looking at a non-digital clock!

My definition of 'pilot error':-

(a) If the PF breaks the aircraft.

(b) If the PF attempts to fly through cumulo-granite, or a TS.

(c) If the PF stalls on approach, too low to recover.

However, if the PF (or the 'system') stalls the aircraft at altitude and can't recover because the controls won't respond or the instruments don't indicate a stall or the PF's training is lacking; then IMHO that is NOT pilot error.

A couple of thoughts-

If icing was present as seems to be indicated to the extent it would affect the pitots then what would extensive airframe icing do to the AUW and was there any indication wing anti ice was being used?

Secondly I find it hard to reconcile being able to achieve a 7000fpm ROC in two and a half thousand feet from F350? Even if it was possible the ballistics and KE of a 205 ton aircraft going up at that rate would see it going quite a bit higher IMHO. In a light aircraft at lower levels it is extremely rare to see more than 6000fpm with a light aircraft never mind the pitch rate to achieve that ?

So maybe external forces were more of a factor.

Not sure Simulators would be able to accurately reproduce this situation with no empirical data.

Clogging of the pitots is thought to be caused by ingestion of ice particles. At -40 °C there was no liquid water to cause icing of the airframe.

Increasing rate of climb to 7000 and back to 700 fpm is compatible with no more than about +/- 0.2 g.

- incorrect. Liquid water can and does exist in the atmosphere at temperatures well below -40 as super-cooled water drops or normal drops carried aloft by rising air, hence the need to be aware of what is under you before you elect NOT to use engine anti-icing. The statement is a myth based on the meteorological fact that at temperatures below -40 air cannot normally contain significant concentrations of water droplets or water vapour.

Hi BOAC,

I thought it was due to the "Latent Heat of Fusion" (enthalpy of fusion). Supercooled water droplets at -40 and below, will freeze on impact to form dry ice crystals(*) and hence won't stick. If you apply gentle heating, you may warm it into the wet range and it may stick (AF744 Pitot Problem?). If you apply loads of heat, it will remain wet and blow off.

(* I don't mean solid CO2)

The super cooled stuff becomes a problem with small pasageways (probes) and small continuous sheds just big enough to bend the small compressor blade tips (sensitive internal areas of the engine).

The stuff on the wings (if it even sticks) is expected to shed (under air loads alone) often enough to not affect aerodynamics..

agree, moreover the gain of height (3000 ft) seems to little compared to the 7000 climb rate. May seen this as a sign of iced wings.
I do not see the need to hit the TC itself. To enter the cloud what is generated by the TC, containing huge amount of ice and supercoold liquid water is enough to overload the anti-ice capabilities of that aircraft.

I think we're getting a little fixated on the 7,000ft/min climb. That was reported by the BEA as the max rate of climb - we don't actually know if that was sustained for any length of time.

We know at 2h10m05s they were ate FL350 and at 2h10m50 were at FL375. So, that's actually less than a minute for a 2,500ft altitude gain. Overall, the rate must have been much less than 7,000ft/min for a good portion of that climb.

We also know there was nose-up sidestick but updrafts could have played a part too.

On 737 Classic & NG, Boeing procedures always stated that due to any moisture at less than -40c being "likely" to be in the form of ice crystals, it was not required to activate engine anti-ice when in climb or cruise with SAT < -40c, but still advised during descent (assumedly because you are descending into "warmer" air more likely to contain liquid moisture)
Boeing has recently released a bulletin (covering all types) which details incidents involving icing/surges/flameouts caused by these "safe" crystals forming ice on impact with engines (guess pitots would be something similar) but stops short of recommending activating TAI in climb/cruise when SAT < -40c.
I find this just a little ineffectual, surely if they are advising of a real risk, they should be at least recommending you disregard the <-40 exemption ? ? or am I missing something here ?

Hi,

Bodies recovery ended ......

7 June 2011 briefing

Google Vertaling

I remember very well that Air France .. in their communications (before black boxes data released) insisted on the fact that failure of pitot was a factor but not essential
Seem's they have changed their song lyrics ....

Hi,

Psychology brief analysis of small events in the cockpit:
Is this the role of the captain to "attend" or instead (more logical in my view as he is the accountable commander) to "lead" the briefing ?
Why the PNF tell "maybe" ... he is affraid of the PF .. if he was more direct ?
Do the PF not see what action to take ?

I find this just a little ineffectual, surely if they are advising of a real risk, they should be at least recommending you disregard the <-40 exemption ? ? or am I missing something here ?

Good point. I always turn on anti-ice even below -40 C when I see ice forming on the wiper blade.

The point made earlier about systems design error will be a central factor. There is no excuse for the stall warning not sounding all the way down to impact. That's why it is there. If both AOA probes show angle of attack past the stall it should sound period. Speed should have no effect on that. I think the effect of it not sounding led the pilots away from positively identifying the real problem.

I also take issue with the fact that there can be a stabiliser configuration that can keep the nose up into a full stall forever even if the engines are reduced to idle. But I am just a pilot and it seems I don't need to know of this until after somebody is dead.

I am all for round dials too, but I doubt anyone is listening...

Auto-Ego
 

IMHO a critical fault in “every” design is the tendency shown by “smart” ppl to disregard real life events and those which have to deal with it. Automation is just a tool; therefore it should be treated as what it is… Nothing more. Following that philosophy, the hammer should be in the hands of the carpenter and NOT the other way around… We already know that the FBW system isn´t as perfect as many would like it to be. I fully agree with TheShadow and his great post: #1222…

Translations of BEA reports
 

The english translations of the original French BEA reports must be treated with caution. The BEA clearly states that the authoritative version is the original French copy.
That said it is interesting that the Capt was present for the bad weather briefing and then immediately left the cabin. IMHO seeing a solid wall of red on the weather radar at night is not boring and is not a trigger for taking a nap rest. Puzzling CRM.

Then I fear you too are not prepared to READ the BEA note carefully and try to correlate what TheShadow asserts happen verses what is reported. The two DO NOT line up.

For one and very important point, TheShadow asserts that the aircraft was placed into the initial climb by the automation at drop out, but that is NOT what the BEA reports:

Since this simple statement is completely ignored (since it doesn't fit with the story TheShadow is telling), it follows that other salient and significant points are also misused or ignored to fit. It is true that the limited details we do have leaves much unanswered, but you can be pretty damn sure that the info we do have is correct and meaningful (least otherwise the wrath of the aviation community will descend on the BEA and all associated).