How, pray tell, were the crew of AF447 supposed to fly out of something they never even knew existed. As the CVR indicates they made a minor course correction because of concerns about turbulence, not icing. They never knew there was ice. They never knew that the ice had closed the tubes. They never knew that the clogged tubes caused the UAS. We know those things to be facts. They knew none of it.

The most dangerous thing about comments like your bubbers44 is that everyone starts flying in response to the last accident so that the next accident, once again, takes everyone by surprise. Being scared of one's shadow is the worst possible outcome.

MBear - they did not need to know what had caused the loss of IAS indication. To apply backstick with a ridiculously low IAS flies in the face of any logic. I still find it difficult to accept any trained pilot would do it.

Step - "160 pages in, and this should have been said--and of course has been any number of times--maybe 150 pages ago and this thread closed. Deal with it".- you are forgetting the 150 times per thread on previous threads.

Why is the biggest question and is the priority. It indicates a major chasm in AF training - and I fear probably across other AB companies too.

Boeing 727 Accident Conclusions:

The aircraft accumulated sufficient ice during its flight to block the drain holes and total pressure inlet ports. Static ports were not affected.

The flightcrew misconstrued the operation of the stall warning STICK SHAKER as mach buffet.

The flightcrew continued to increase the nose up attitude of the aircraft following the operation of the stick shaker

Following the stall the aircraft entered into a right spiralling dive at a high rate of descent. Throughout the descent the flightcrew reacted primarily to airspeed and rate of descent indications instead of attitude indications and this failed to initiate recovery techniques and procedures.

In an effort to recover the aircraft from the high rate of descent the flightcrew exerted excessive pull forces on the control column.

CAUSE:

The NTSB determines that the probable cause of this accident was the loss of control of the aircraft because the flightcrew failed to recognize and correct the aircraft high angle of attack and low speed stall. The stall was precipitated by the flightcrews improper reaction to erroneous airspeed and mach indications which had resulted from a blockage of the pitot heads by atmospheric ice.

Sound familiar. Now perhaps BOAC when you reread Aeroperu, Birginair and several others, you could perhaps expand on your fear that this is something to do with airbus. :ugh::ugh::ugh::ugh::ugh:

The truth hurts but you need to look closer to home for this one. It is the mark I human being at fault, nothing else.

Let go of SS, Iceman50
 

I question that, depending on your undestanding of "initial input". If you define that as before the pitch reached more than 5°, i might accept.

In Alt2B without protections the FCP follows an loadfactor demand. If, for example, the initial loadfactor demand called for 1,5 g´s and that resulted in an pitch attitude of 15°, releasing of SS input would now demand a loadfactor of 1 g. This new load factor demand would lead to maintaining the 15° pitch regardless of speed decay.
Although if no further input for a NU demand will be made on the SS (in neutral as you say), the FCP would continue to drive the elevators NU and start to trim the THS NU to maintain this one g equaling the pitch at SS release in the decaying speed situation. Result will be a stall with 15° pitch, elevators and THS full nose up.

Does this sound familiar?

What you described would be the behaviour of a conventional aircraft, where elevators return to neutral when NU input is terminated and with no trim input the aircraft would answer the decreasing speed with a decrease in pitch and climb rate to find its equilibrium / stable state of flight again.

Or it would be the behaviour of a FBW aircraft with protections working.

I think you are aware of that, i just wanted it to make clear for other readers.
If i´m wrong, please post.

Clearly they were trained pilots. Let's assume they weren't incapacitated by drugs or medical problems (?) what could conceivably have caused trained pilots to do just that? Something made them make those decisions.

RetiredF4
 

Hi Franzl,

It was "looked" at in ALT Law and to get anywhere near 15 degrees will take a lot of sustained effort. It also looks way wrong on the PFD.

Safety Concerns writes...

Well yes but isn't it the job of aircraft designers and pilot trainers to look at previous instances of human failure and try to reduce the chances of other people making the same mistake again?

How long has it been known that pilots sometimes fail to recognise they are stalled? The examples you and others provided clearly show it's happened before.

Could/should something have been done about the issue sooner? Should something be done now? Would it really cost much? Have accidents become so rare that even relatively cheap changes fail cost v benifit analysis?

Re iceman50
 

But that is, what happened here with AF447. They got way over 5° and stalled.

2:10:08 = pitch 5°
2:10:15 = pitch 10°
2:10:30 = pitch 13°
2:11:00 = pitch 15°
2:11:08 = pitch max pitch about 17°

And releaving SS at that moment would not have changed anything to a positive outcome. Releasing at less pitch than 15° would only lengthen the timeframe till stall would occur if not dealt with the problem by SS ND.

So my question was (and still is), to what time/ pitch you reference your term "after the initial pitch up"?
Even the 5° pitch would not be good for endless time, as same as stated above would apply. No protection, therefore maintaining 5° pitch until speed is below stall speed and same time elevators and THS full NU. It would take considerable more time and would leave more time to counteract though.

It´s important to understand aerodynamic and energy management also in an FBW protectet aircraft, when those protections and ATHR go southbound.

Yes absolutely. But the issue here is being blurred (as always) by unnecessary and irrelevant references to manufacturers and one manufacturer in particular.

It may surprise many of you but it is a fact that most airspeed related accidents have been in Boeings whereas most airspeed related incidents have been in Airbus's. Which would you prefer, an accident or an incident?

I haven't witnessed any great cries for design change on the Boeings.

So remove the emotion, argue facts, tune in with your aircraft and the designers will work with you to improve safety.

Safety Concerns, in re this:
Are you referring to the human beings who failed to replace the Thales pitot probes, even though an airworthiness directive had been issued to that effect?
Are you referring to the human beings who are in charge of training at AF?
Are you referring to the Captain of AF 447, and his decisions?
Are you referring to the PNF who didn't take the controls?
Are you referring to the PF who held a high nose attitude, and seems to have applied a low altitude solution to a high altitude problem? (Go back to the training, and how you reward people for various performance.)
Are you referring to the human beings who believed that disabling stall warning when the aircraft is stalled (< 60 kts) while airborne is a good design approach?

Which human beings are you referring to, Safety Concerns?

Safety Concerns

I hope by "human" you meant to include the designers because if not,its grossly unfair to the pilots.Are you really saying that the interface design contributed nothing to the probable cause whatsoever?
An experienced Airbus pilot left a post saying how sensitive SS control was at even low altitude.What about high altitude with little buffet margin and throw in moderate(perhaps worse) turbulence..what then?How easy would it be to overcontrol then?The forearm must rest on an armrest with the wrist as the pivot point for SS control in an Airbus.Great for small precise control inputs in smooth air.But what about during a high alt upset in rough air when the forearm might become dislodged.The stick isnt between your legs,its off to one side.
And then theres no feel feedback.And the PNF cant see what the PF is commanding on the stick.Hes out of the loop so its effectively a single crew response.The PNF can override and try his luck but theres no way for both pilots to work it in tandem.They can override each other or they can work in opposition with the computer adding the inputs algebraically or cancelling each other out.And who knows who's really in control?The "priority" audio call and the visual green/red arrow on the glareshield might be fine in a normal situation.But in a bad situation with turbulence and with loads of ECAM warnings?These channels get dumped quickly.You just wouldnt get this in a conventional aircraft.YOU SEE BOTH STICKS.YOU SEE WHAT THE OTHER GUY IS DOING WITH HIS STICK.YOU WORK IT TOGETHER IN EXTREME CASES WITHOUT ANY NEED FOR AUDITORY/VISUAL FEEDBACK.ITS ALL TACTILE.

And then the autotrim cutting out with THS at max ANU.Do you think pilots have time in a bad situation to look at the ECAM and start deciphering what effect the changing laws have on what theyre doing?If they can remember.ALT LAW..right, I have no stall warning protection.ABNORMAL LAW..right, trim is manual.THEY FLY THE PLANE FIRST AND FOREMOST.And the stall warning inhibit?Going off when the aircraft was in a deep stall?This is acceptable design is it?All this complex and frankly suspect interface design didnt have any effect whatsoever on the outcome??

The Airbus is a video game,nothing more.In normal ops,Im prepared to believe its the most wonderful thing since slice bread.

It is quite incredible how far off track you guys have become.

The design interface played no more of a role in AF447 as did Boeings design interface in NW6231 back in 1974.

Everything posted in the previous two posts as in BOAC's silly slip up highlights nothing more than YOUR personal refusal to get in tune with the aircraft. The proof is that your clarion calls for change would have us believe that stick shakers and feedback and no electronic software would have resulted in a different outcome.

WAKE UP CALL: Aeroperu, Birgenair, NW 6231. Thats 3 Boeings so why haven't you called for major design changes on them?

I quote again the President of the Flight Safety Foundation

"This should have resulted in a log entry"

Re
 

Lets not drift off the truth.

Automatic trim was working in Alternate Law, only in direct law autotrim is not available. Autotrim was not cutting out, the situation with loadfactor demand by SS and decreasing speed caused the NU trim to travel full up and also kept it there. The crew did not understand that and it looks that after some hundred of pages it´s still not understood.

That is not true, pilots want tactile feedback and better machine- human interface. That is a legit demand of the people who have to fly those aircraft under (unfortunately only) abnormal conditions. .

As i stated before, adopt to that demand and design something new and better instead denying the need for improvement. Its the task of the manufacturers´with the designers and engineers to make apropriate recomendations for those necessary improvements. The pilot comunity will bring the old reference (stick and all other old but functioning input tools) as an way to describe the need for change in layman terms, not as a demand that it has to be in the exact old way.

I told you that before, and i thought you got it and would be able to communicate in the future on that basis. Instead you fall back in the old A vs. B and old vs new saga.

That does not take care on the aim to improve safety.

It's not BOAC's fault - the received wisdom in the piloting community is that the dependence on automation and company edicts to use the automatics wherever possible started with the introduction of the A320. A little digging will reveal that this is not the case, with full-featured FMS being around since the '70s and widespread on the line with the introduction of the 757 and 767 in the late '70s/early '80s.

It's possible that it became even more widespread later on, but I'd argue that probably has more to do with the retirement of the "old school" management and executive levels, many of whom had worked their way up through the airline, or indeed founded it - and their replacement with the newer generation of MBA grads who were more purely bottom-line orientated. Unfortunately this also happened to coincide with the introduction on the A320 in the late '80s and early '90s, which may have served to reinforce the perception.

Exactly but it is pilots who have posted airbus attack after airbus attack even though Boeing has suffered more accidents under similar conditions

To quote just a few of the more ridiculous comments.

Analogue aircraft suffered the same outcomes under the same conditions. Yet safety is better today than then. Going back won't achieve anything as won't the constant consistent misinformed uneducated criticism of one manufacturer over the other.

That message still aligns with retired f4

"Something made them make those decisions."

From the CVR and their subsequent actions it appears that the UAS indications with sudden AP disconnection and reversion to alternate law took them completely by surprise. This sort of behavior from the aircraft was something totally unexpected and for which they were emotionally unprepared. They were "gobsmacked" and and what training they did have, just went out of the window - no actioning of lists, no attempt at analysis, no rational response at all, just fiddling in increasing confusion with the primary flight controls as more and more warning messages flashed and audible alarms blared on and off as the situation deteriorated.

Finally they were completely lost as the PF admitted ("I have no control of the aircraft") with no coherent mental image of the situation - even the altimeter winding rapidly down seemed unreal, and the Captain appeared on the scene far too late to compose his own perception or take any meaningful action.

A tragedy composed of overconfident automation design compounded by pilot complacency and inadequate systems training.

- indeed it did and made it worse, and before that all pilots KNEW that they could stall an aircraft (and did as we know) by 'mishandling'. Following that they were told they could not (I have lost count of the number of the blatherings about it I heard from those operators in the 80's) and unfortunately a large number believed it. I hope that cult memory is slowly being eradicated, and as I said before, that both AB and AB pilots are having some serious thoughts about the way they present and operate the type. I suspect/hope this and the PGF crash have opened a few eyes. The parallel I draw is the driver I saw last winter here who, dazzled by the brilliance of the 'perfect' ABS in his car, was amazed when it let him slide into another car on sheet ice.

Safety Concern
 

I tend to agree with you, although i would not call them ridicolous but far fetched or not quite derived from the necessary system understanding. And that is one of the training problems, not a personal misbehaviour.

Not all pilots make those comments, some originate out of the early days of the discussion where the knowledge base was still narrow and lot of speculation was involved. If you have an an understanding of pilots work and believe their desire for an improvement, it should be possible to answer in a more positive way instead of total opposition. F.e. like thinking about how those systems can be improved.

Then the discussion changes from "why should we improve the system" to "how can we improve the system".

And the term "system" i reference to all involved parties, including pilots and including manufacturers.

you can draw this parallel as long as it is done on the following basis:

30 years ago 100 cars a winter were sliding into other cars on sheet ice. Today we have reduced that to 10. Our aim is to reduce further.

You cannot draw this parallel if you do it on the basis that Honda's ABS is flawed because I want my own foot to do the braking as in my Chevy whilst quietly overlooking the small issue of more accidents in a chevy.

The a/c lost a/p, changed FlghtLaw, and required handling.

The LAW eliminates PITCH protection, and the a/c is considered lively, certainly more active than NORMAL.


No judgment, but a starting point, and one suspiciously missing some easy to include safety features, and training changes.

Judgment: There is confusion, among the people who fly her, whether the correct action is:

1. Resist Manual Flight, be patient.

2. Set 5 degrees NOSE UP. (See 1, above)

3. Start eliminating Warnings via the "BOOK".


Unless and until these points are addressed, and by addressed I mean Remedied, not mitigated, the rest is distraction.

Where is the difference between that and NW6231?

If you are talkin' to me, the difference is irrelevant. Comparing accidents, like comparing a/c, is a Hangar game. Each one is exquisitely individual, and in lumping them together, the trap is set for continued human nonsense.

edit. IMHO

Quoting Lyman:-

Terrific point, in my view, Lyman.

Does anyone know whether Airbus simulators are configured to 'simulate' the effects of 'law changes'? I'd be very surprised to hear that they are - but (given that the pilots cannot overrule the 'laws') introducing such a training facility would seem to be a very logical step?

After all - as we've all sensed from this accident - when the pilots had less than four minutes to save the aeroplane, the passengers, AND themselves, surely the last thing they should have had to do was to try to recall the small print of the various 'laws'?

Hope it's done, anyway. I've encountered a certain amount of flak by suggesting areas, following this crash, in which safety might be augmented by constructive changes in current SOPs. That's second nature to me; in my own career (like those of most other people) a policy of 'continuous improvement' became second nature.

However good you may reckon anything you and your colleagues have devised to be, it's never going to be perfect. But - if the will is there - you can always find ways to move CLOSER to perfection.

Sincerely hope that Airbus (and the other manufacturers) rapidly learn, and respond to, the lessons of this accident.

actually its not. Now we are getting to the nitty gritty of it all.
Just one post after yours come this nonsense

The post was clearly directed at Airbus, heavily implying some perceived design flaw.

Yet NW6231 (a boeing 727) also only had a few minutes to save the aircraft, DID NOT have to concern themselves with the small print of which law and still crashed. As did aeroperu (757) and birgenair (757) after both suffering from pitot or static issues.

So the real issue is not manufacturer related at all.

Should, yes, considering the matter of 32 other (similar but not identical) incidents that did not impact terra firma, nor terra aqua.

Perhaps there is more to this than you'd prefer to admit.
Back to the systemic issues, which involves humans and decisions: why not understood?
With 32 previous incidents of something related, why by surprise? Which human errors lead to that situation?
Those are three factors whose weight we can quibble about, but I think Mack summed up the major human factors, less one.

Why the equipment change (airworthiness directive relates to this) had not been completed.

As before, while it "should" have been a logbook entry, the necessary condition for this mishap, which arose from a multiple malfunction, was a piece of hardware that failed in triplicate, in a known failure mode. Absent the iced up tubes, not even a log book entry.

Safety, not the manufacturer "at all"?"

Sorry, I don't care about A vs B, just about good system and good interface and good tools.

If you can explain to me, in plain language, why a stall warning system goes dormant while the aircraft is stalled, in flight, and tell me why this is allegedlyl a good design, I'd sure like to hear it.

In this case, would it have made a difference?

No idea, the crew were behind the aircraft, and how that might have helped them catch up I can only guess. It might have helped the Captain when he arrived, not sure.

"so the real issue is not the manufacturer at all."

As that is what I intended to say, :ok:

May I make a further Point? Some discussion here tends to lump Training in with something that I associate with autoflight. ROTE.

It is the very difference between Human piloting and autoflight that creates the possibility of near perfect safety numbers.

Sadly, it is glossed over. Training is not (should not be, only) the drive to commit to memory.

It must be the pursuit of what Humans do so well, and why I think we will never see "unattended" (commercial) Flight?

Innovation, and Intuition. Tempered with EXPERIENCE, NOT TRAINING.

Knowledge plus experience = WISDOM. And wisdom is priceless, deserves a comfortable salary, and dismissal of errant critique, absent the same WISDOM.

Program your computers, and I say, BULLY! Programming the human animal is a fools errand. And ignorant of the resource to hand.

386 or SULLY? For crying out loud, can we not have both?

Quoting Safety Concerns:-

"The post was clearly directed at Airbus, heavily implying some perceived design flaw."

Can't help recalling my days as Reserve artilleryman, Safety. And a marvellously-humorous lecture that an American officer gave us on the perennial subject of the 'Dual-Purpose Gun' - which could have operated with equal efficiency against both tanks and infantry (if only someone had ever managed to invent one).

I recall him saying at one stage, "Frankly, gentlemen - and ladies - after a long career in weapons development - I can't help but conclude, up to the present time, that the only truly-effective 'dual-purpose gun' ever invented was the one God gave to man......"

Do you believe that the design of the A330 (and the relevant training procedures) are already so perfect that they cannot be improved?

If not, surely you'll agree that it is the duty of both the designers and the trainers to learn as much as they can from this event?

@BOAC
I agree with you. Go back and read my post because you appear to have misunderstood my point.

This is the point I was trying to make. It is a grievous error and frankly an endless game to design training around preventing the last accident. I have harped on this point before. Safety is a process.

Elaboration? Comparing accidents, then, is not only unhelpful, but infects the process with the tentacles of the flaws of the past.

Contrast? yes, there we go? because to compare is to get stuck, to contrast is to allow progress, not (but approaching!) perfection.

Two years ago ...
 

Hi,

Since we seem to going in circles .. why not leave the circle and take a tangent that takes us back two years ago when the first research to refresh our memories and try to understand why these two years have passed before we could go round in circles around preliminary BEA reports.
Of the beginning and certainly after the publication of ACARS and expert commentary it soon became apparent that the AF447 had not made a gliding flight but instead of ... the fall had to be fast or because of a stall or a result of a spin entry
Whether one or both of these reasons .. obviously has the time it was known that the fall was rapid (nearly vertical)
Early research in the area near last known position (with inadequate equipment .. and we knew it) did not yield results.
The experts knows that this first search was not correct (inadequate gear)
Instead of repeating the research in this area (with the good gear) .. and despite all this knowledge and despite some warnings of external analysis it was decided to do (with the right equipment this time) for further research in areas where it was impossible (practically) that the aircraft go ( 100 km from the last pos)
After the discovery of the black boxes the BEA give some explanations for the failure of the first search.
In fact the BEA explanations shown some things .. the complete failure of the BEA to conduct professionally a search for a disappeared plane (for this particular plane at least) .. or more things for imaginative people
And BEA can't argue that they don't know that pingers can fail .. they can fail
And anyways .. the first research gear used was not good even if the pingers were active at this time.
The BEA duty is to improve safety ... and in the most quickest time possible
By the BEA failure in researches a precious time was lost for publish new recommendations
The BEA explanations are not satisfactory .. and as many other subjects related AF447 .. they will be scrutinized accurately in a other room than a press meeting venue or a forum
We can now return in our AF447 hamsterwheel

And here we clearly have the problem. In the first quote a specific manufacturer is mentioned, why for what purpose other then to run down the manufacturer.

The second quote is intended to further enhance the position of far too many pilots that the airbus is somehow not really designed for them.

But there is hope because the last few words are safety is a process.

The FACT is that regardless of current design, regardless of analogue or digital, regardless of european or American or whatever, pilots when confronted with extraordinary circumstances, often miss the warning signs about a situation and then end up making a wrong decision. Safety is a process that will correct that in the end.

What the safety process won't do however is entertain you biased, uneducated comments specifically directed at one manufacturer. It may do if there is evidence or statistics confirming a significant difference in accident rate.

There isn't.

So don't mix issues. Everybody in aviation is committed to improving safety. It will be done on the back of facts and not emotions. Because if we did follow emotions and go backwards, safety levels will decrease.

The point I am making is quite simple and based upon todays facts. Apparently intelligent pilots keeping come back in a misguided attempt to prove that black is in fact white.

Stick feedback, throttle feedback, AOA indicators, direct law, normal law have had no effect on accidents for forty years. The weakest link has always been and will probably remain the human interface, the pilot.

Designers are working very hard to design a foolproof system. However one only has top read some of the posts here to comprehend what an impossible tasks they have.

I take it then that you are an expert professional in underwater searches in the Mid-Atlantic (3000m depth plus), to profess such a judgment.
Do you work for Wood Hole? If not, why didn't you offer your services?

And I even suppose you don't know the expression "needle in haystack".....
Slightly dumb remark.... Some recommendations HAVE already been published, and so far I haven't seen any crashes similar to AF447. What "precious time" was lost?
Maybe not to you, since they don't match your conspiracy theories.
I doubt you've ever been part of a real accident investigation.

Airbus* changed their tune nearly two decades ago, after they lost Nick Warner. Honest question, and I don't want you to think I'm getting at you - when was the last time you honestly heard an Airbus pilot or TRE say that it was impossible to stall the aircraft under any circumstances? If it was more recent than the mid-'90s I'd be inclined to suggest you report them to their chief pilot, because that's a dangerous misapprehension.


Then that's another fundamental misunderstanding of how the ABS system works - it does exactly what it says on the tin in that it will release the brake pads for a split-second if it detects the wheels locking up - in essence it's just automating what is known as "cadence braking" if you do it manually. It doesn't necessarily stop you in any shorter distance than regular brakes (in fact some of the earlier systems actually induced a *longer* stopping distance than with correctly-applied conventional brakes), but what it does do is give you more control over steering than you have with locked wheels. On ice, even with ABS working full-chat, your stopping distance will still be significantly greater and your ability to steer will still be severely compromised. Heaven knows I've read many road safety articles over the years warning drivers that ABS will not necessarily stop them in a shorter distance even under normal conditions, let alone on wet roads or ice, and it's astonishing how little this information is understood by drivers, though in my experience most driving instructors are aware of those limitations if you ask them.

You'd like to think that pilots, TREs especially, would have a more in-depth knowledge of the systems they are training people to use!

@RWA - From what I understand from talking to current and former line pilots, the FBW Airbus simulators do indeed simulate the behaviour under different laws. I think it was PJ2 on the Tech Log threads who mentioned that he took a sim check that simulated failure all the way down to Manual Reversion mode, where the only controls available are the pitch trim and rudder - he also mentioned that he successfully landed the simulator, but was thankful he wasn't faced with the challenge in real life.

No design is perfect, but on here opinion seems to be clearly divided as to whether the decision to go without tactile feedback was a major oversight. The opinion that it was seems to be largely held by people who've never flown the thing, and it seems that most that have don't regard it as a major loss. As a non-pilot I'm bound to watch what I say and hold a neutral position on the subject, but from what I understand about the design and training as a holistic entity I'm inclined to agree with the latter. I have yet to be presented with incontrovertible evidence that any FBW Airbus incident to date would have been avoided by having the sidesticks connected via backdrive.

Opinion seems to be split as to how the A330 handles under Alternate Law - so far we've had one pilot saying that they were surprised at the increase in response, and IIRC two saying that there wasn't that much difference and they adapted to it fairly quickly. The pilot in the former case seemed to believe that Airbus was directly involved in the de-skilling of pilots, a claim which again I've seen no evidence to support - so I'm less inclined to trust his opinion. At least one of the latter is well-respected on here as a no-nonsense senior pilot whose opinion I therefore trust implicitly.

[* - By which I mean the marketing department and executives - the engineering department had always been realistic about the aircraft's capabilities (good though they were)... ]

human interface
 

That is your assumption, i know lots of accidents where one or another part was contributing to the cause.

I hope that last sentence is a misspelling.

The pilot is not the human interface, he is the user of it.
The human interface starts with all aircraft systems which output information to the pilot and ends with all aircraft systems, the pilot operates, and the most important part is feedback.

If you see the pilot as human interface, then i understand your communication problem with the pilot community.

Dozy;
Yep. Nature trumps automation every time.

The sim experience (fully manual flight on THS and differential engine thrust) was done during the initial course on the A340 and it worked sufficiently to get onto the runway. The A320 was much easier to control under the same circumstances, primarily due to mass and the need to anticipate much earlier for the A340 and would be a huge challenge but doable.

Tactile feedback simply wasn't an issue for most. While there are always counterexamples, no pilots I discussed Airbus issues with commented that moving thrust levers, sidestick positions, artificial pressure during out-of-trim conditions etc were fundamental to flying the aircraft. The key discussion point for us was always the airline's restriction on hand-flying and the absence of such practise in the simulator. The manual was written in such a way as to permit/encourage hand-flying and there was also an "appropriate-level-of-automation" list which provided good guidance for the engagement of automation, (fully automatic, to fully manual), but the trouble was, because no one was practised at it, they lost the touch and the confidence to disengage everything and that is a self-fulfilling series of actions. The policies were good and permitted the decision to disengage, but were not actively encouraged, the reason given being "fuel consumption". But automation is a god-send at the end of a long-haul flight and is an enormous enhancement to flight safety - it just has to be understood, and trained/checked well.

At least one exercise should be included in any practise session (not on the ride), and that is climbing and descending S-turns with changes in speed - fully manual flight including manual thrust levers, and no flight directors. It is a worthwhile exercise which takes about 20 minutes of sim time for both pilots and is a lot of fun (and is very revealing!)

A no-FD hand-flown ILS approach to CATI limits is already in the script and so are steep turns, but the above exercise is a good coordination, instrument-scan one...it should be done in Alternate then Direct Law, but one thing at a time.

human factors
 

Some pieces out of the final report from Gulf Air manamana 2000
final report

The accident itself has nothing in common with AF447, but it highlight the human factor somewhat closer. That might help the discussion in understanding the difference between blame and detailed accident investigation.



As said before, there are no similarities between the accidents, this post only should point to the fact, that pilots are no supermans and that human errors are also mostly systemic errors.

Hi,

I suppose you will tell the same to the judges (and lawyers) in the court of justice to refute the findings or even possibly say that there are no courts to judge the case since the justices have never participated in an investigation of aviation accidents.
Do you think your arguments will be reviewed and considered ?

no retired F4 I just lost it with those tunnel visioned pilots determined to run down a perfectly good and very safe but not perfect technology at any cost.

My point is this isn't about A V B, this is about moving forward with design improving its user friendliness and ability to produce the necessary feedback in a manner which ensures maximum transfer of info without overloading.

I cannot and will not accept the constant uneducated, ill informed, negative comments about one manufacturer's approach based upon emotion and not fact.

There is no way to communicate that message politely because one is dealing with ignorance.

@jcjeant - As I said to Bearfoil/Lyman on the Tech Log threads, be very careful when tangling with ChristiaanJ - on the off-chance you're unaware, the man was a senior engineer on Concorde during development and service and - to coin a phrase - he's likely forgotten more about aircraft design in terms of aerodynamics and the human/machine interface than you or I could ever hope to know, and just from reading his public posts I've learned an absolute shedload.

Apropos of nothing, here's a brief blogpost on the man responsible more than anyone else for the A320's (and by extension her descendants) handling characteristics:

Gordon Corps (1929-1992)

Sentences that should be paid particular attention to include (emphasis mine):

(Yes - *that* Dave (D.P.) Davies, the one who wrote what many still consider the Bible of heavy jet handling characteristics nearly 40 years after it's last edition. Prior to that, Captain Corps was effectively Davies' SIC)

I hope this helps to lay to rest any remaining belief that the A320 series was designed without the input of pilots, and indeed was designed with the input of at least one of the most skilled and safety-conscious pilots who ever lived.

It was Captain Corps who devised the previously-mentioned simulator test that proved to at least one sceptical pilot that the A320's systems, including bank and pitch limitations, were more than capable of permitting emergency escape maneouvres with a better success rate than conventional control designs.

Captain Corps sadly died of altitude sickness in 1992 when investigating a fatal accident on Talkuassir mountain, which, though tragic, demonstrated his commitment to safety in the air above all else (and frankly what our cousins in the US would call "brass balls") - how many 62-year-old men can you think of who would risk a treacherous journey to the Himalayas just to be the point man for an accident investigation?

From a personal perspective, another tragic consequence of his death, which I've mentioned before, is that the contributions of Captain Bernard Ziegler (who was first and foremost a sales evangelist) to the history of the Airbus FBW project, of which there were many that were controversial, are common knowledge among the piloting community - but the contributions of Captain Corps (who was a technical and engineering pilot with hours logged in more types than many can name off the top of their head, and an acute knowledge of the good and bad points of *all* of them) are nowhere near as well-known. Part of me wonders whether if he had lived long enough to complete his retirement, he'd have written a book which would have picked up where Davies left off, and left no doubt in the minds of the pilots and engineers who read it, that the design considerations of the A320 series were thoroughly thought through and had to get through the approval of this formidable aviator before they would pass muster.

Safety Concerns
I doubt you can support that statement, given how contributory factors add up in aircraft mishaps of any brand, not to mention the variety of change, modification, and adjustment the industry has made in forty years.

But let's try another view on this: is half a truth a whole lie? If it is, then you could be accused of lying (or simply being wrong) even if there is something in your statement close to the truth.

You can make a case that any single one of the above were not the sole cause of a mishap over the past 40 years, and my guess is that you'd be able to support it.

Since we may never get good granularity on the recent crash (early morning) in Libya, thanks to that bit of Arab Spring, whatever factors contributed to that remain lost to the industry at large.

(Here's hoping I am wrong about that).