"....it would be like entering an arse-kicking contest with a monstrous entity that has a thousand legs - and no arse"

DW, thanks for that. Saved for future use.

Back to impersonal mattershttp://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/sr...lies/wink2.gif

There has been a lot of debate on whether the aircraft could have been recovered from the stall and if so how much height would have been needed. I think what has been missing is not so much a question whether it could have been brought back inside the flight envelope but a recognition that it was actually held in the stall by pilot action and that the first stage of recovery would have been simply to remove the up elevator by relaxing on the sidestick. This would not have been sufficient by itself, but would have removed any doubts about the efficacy of down elevator, application of which would have further reduced the AoA and brought the THS back towards 3 deg NU rather than 13 deg.
I hope what follows is not too confusing, but the graph, which is taken from the AIAA/NASA/Boeing report on upset recovery is as near as Gums is going to get to pitching moment curves for the A330. Looking at the model test geometry it is difficult to see anything that would make these curves substantially different from the A330. Even so, treat them as qualitative not quantitative.
http://i1080.photobucket.com/albums/...cmalpha2-1.jpg">
On the zero elevator line you can see the typical mild pitch up near the stall that I mentioned in an earlier posting.
For the tail geometries typical of modern civil designs, the relative pitching power of THS and elevator would be about 1deg THS equivalent to 1.5 deg elevator. So for a THS set at -13 deg we can read these curves at about 20 deg up elevator to get a feel for things. This would take us up to a trimmed AoA (Cm = 0) of just over 20 deg. However, if you add 30 deg up elevator, you would end up at just over 40 deg AoA, which is pretty similar to AF447 in the same state. So to get to the high AoAs we see from the DFDR data, it looks like you have to be holding full back stick as well as having the THS at -13 deg.
If you now return the stick to neutral at this elevated AoA you get a substantial nose down pitching moment which will take the aircraft back towards sanity. But it will not take it the whole way – just back to the AoA set by the THS angle.
To get back inside the flight envelope you MUST apply some down elevator, which will give another substantial recovery pitching moment but also will, with the A330 logic, start to return the THS back to its cruise setting of -3 deg.
To get an idea how much height loss is involved, you can approximate by a simple energy height trade and a pull-up. Simple geometry says that this latter is surprisingly small. Obviously it depends on the steepness of the descent, the airspeed and the amount of ‘g’ one can pull. This last item also depends on the airspeed. It isn’t any good accelerating to Vs1g because there is no spare lift for the pull-up. To get a reasonable ‘g’, say a 0.5g increment, you need to accelerate to 1.23Vs. Starting from a 20 deg dive the pull-up with that ‘g’ will take about 500 ft altitude.
Starting from 100 kts CAS at 34000 ft and accelerating to say 240 kts CAS at about 28000 ft you need to accelerate from around 300 ft/sec TAS to about 650 ft/sec TAS, which equates to a height loss of just over 5000 ft. Add the 500 ft for a pull-up and in round figures you should be able to recover in 6000 ft altitude.
On that analysis the aircraft WAS recoverable from the stall, but it would have required a definite and sustained nose down elevator application that never materialised – in fact, despite Bear’s latest remarks, DOWN elevator was never applied, just a relaxation of the up elevator

As I said, treat this as a qualitative explanation of what the aerodynamics are likely to have been. Looks quite reasonable to me thoughhttp://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/sr...lies/wink2.gif

Pilots
 

Quote 3holelover
"Two kinds of pilot" I thought. "Old" and "New". "Old" could fly almost anything with wings, but not a newer, glass and computer machine. "New" could fly the computer generation "smart" birds, but probably not an old DC3.

I'm still mulling over those distinctions, but it has occurred to me more recently that this particular airplane needed both kinds of pilot, and the two "New" types that were in the seats just had none of the abilities of that "Old" type. I simply cannot fathom any of the type "Old" failing to recognize a stall. ... at any point during a 35000ft descent.

These poor blighters were more computer programmers than pilots. They needed an old geezer.... and when their best shot at that re-entered the cockpit, he'd missed the beginning of it all, and in any case his AF training had probably left a whole quilt of cobwebs on any "Old" pilot within him.

I'm not sure the distinction should be between old and new but rather those with a passion for the work they do and those for whom it is a job; alas the reality is often the latter in all walks of life but where lives are at risk such as in aviation or medicine I think we would all prefer to be in the hands of those for whom it is a true vocation and are passionate about it.

Whilst it seems clear that there was a serious lack of training, even I, who am not a pilot, would hope that understanding, avoiding and dealing with a stall were first principles of flying.

I do understand the issues are both complex and emotive and have followed the thread since the accident, personally I am horrified at the apparent lack of training and concerned about the recruitment criteria.

It's all about psychology, not technology.

The PF couldn't fly the plane without computer help but he thought (hoped) he could (Dunning-Kruger effect, alias "innocence of youth").
The PNF didn't want to offend him and damage the PF's self-esteem, especially as the PF's wife was in the back.
The PF wanted to get above the turbulence, anyway.
The captain would have marked him down (promotion prospects?) if he'd disturbed him for nothing.
The normal-law disconnection represented an OPPORTUNITY for the PF!

Result -
total disaster - reminiscent of crashes before anybody knew anything about how wings work. The PF didn't know anything (worthwhile) about how the most important machine on the aeroplane (the wings) work. Not surprising, really, when this simple device is shrouded in pseudo-mystery by mathematical nonsense spouted from so many sources.
Perhaps he had never swapped yarns with old-timers over a beer or two. Perhaps he had never heard of "coffin corner". Perhaps he thought that when you said "Up!" the plane always went up, When you said "Down!" the plane always went down. Just like on the computer.
But if you enter a skid, due to too vigorous actions...what then.....
Turn into the skid, of course - if you can do it in time.

What OUGHT to have happened was that the PF said immediately "I'm totally out of my depth here. For God's sake, you take over. I'll get the captain".
"Ce situation est trop difficile pour moi. Prennez-vous les controles, tout de suite. Je vais reculer le capitaine." (apologies for the French)

But that would NOT have gained him any Brownie points. The guy was between a rock and a hard place.

Ozone concentrations as a function of altitude:

http://www.asr.ucar.edu/2004/ACD/Nar...s/image086.gif

^^^^ B and C reflect stratospheric air intruding into the upper troposphere.

AF 447 at FL 350 is 15000 feet below the tropopause boundary. The overshooting top of the Cb near their track is between 52000 and 56000 feet.

http://www.stormchase-wa.com/gallery...mal_img004.jpg

^^^ An overshooting top.

For those struggling with interpreting some of the BEA's FDR traces, the following shows the longitudinal data from prior to AP/ATHR disconnect through to shortly after the aircraft entered the stalling regime.

A few English words have been added, and the AP and ATHR disconnects plus the Stall Warnings are also marked.

http://oi56.tinypic.com/2mx35ua.jpg

Some pages back I had asked abut the effect of thrust from under-slung engines. I was informed that an increase in thrust tended to pitch the aircraft's nose up.
Would I be correct, then, in assuming that reducing thrust to Flight Idle would therefore tend to lower the nose ?
This should help to get the aircraft's wings unstalled sooner. Power could be resumed gently, to reconvert a not too bad glider ( see Sully) to a powered aeroplane again.

But I know a youngster or two today that refuse to have a map in the car (for when their satnav gets them lost)

I can only conclude they don't want to show their ignorance to their girlfriends by holding it the wrong way up and takinga left turn when it should be right :)

Re T54

With due respect, that seems an unreasonable assessment of the PF.
He was a qualified glider pilot, so he had a practical basis for how the aerodynamics work.
He went from a happy situation where the Captain gives him the responsibility in a dark and stormy passage to a nightmare where the instruments play false, including the stall warnings, while the plane bucks and rolls and plunges, despite his best efforts.
With no visual cues and the stall warning turning off when he went slow, while turning back on when he went faster, his despairing comment that 'I don't understand' is entirely reasonable.
There is lots to improve in the training, which clearly should bear the blame, rather than the PF, who was just one of the victims.

Hi,

Level100
I send you a PM .. more easy for understand what I mean (en français of course)

That initial climb (again), and some other questions
 

The 3rd Rapport d'etape adds a lot of detail, and clarifies a lot of what was previously just speculation, and it still tells me that the most interesting part of the event was that extraordinary climb from FL350. Not only did it put the aircraft in a hopeless energy state from which a stall was inevitable, but it also tells us a lot about the instrument flying skills of the PF. In fact it is so bizarre that I am still looking for an 'AHAH' moment that reveals just what it was he was trying to do and how he was doing it. I don't buy the argument that because he had previously thought about climbing out of the turbulence, this was now his way of doing it; no one in their right mind would have done it at that rate, nor deliberately pitched to 10 deg nose up at that level. Nor do I believe that these pitch inputs were inadvertent side effects of lateral inputs - at one point he was achieving 1.6g, and even if some of that was due to turbulence (and there isn't much sign that it was really particularly rough in the 20 sec or so before disconnect), there is still a lot to explain away. The stick force needed to do that isn't zero, some one posted the calibration some time back and I think you need around 5kg pull to do that, hardly inadvertent.

So what was he reacting to? I suggested a month ago that when the speed and Mach became invalid the altitude corrections would have been wrong causing a sudden change in indicated altitude, as happened in the Air Caraibes incident. In that case the change was -300ft, not a huge amount but just possibly enough to prompt the PF to want to pull up. the current BEA report's graphs don't show any such jump, though, intriguingly, the table on pages 92/93 shows that at the start at 2:10:05 the altitude (on the left PFD?) was 35 024ft, while 4 seconds later at 2:10:09 it is shown as 34 664ft, so I guess there was a jump. Nothing other than a complete disregard of attitude explains PF's later insistence 'Okay, okay okay je redescends', and similar phrases, when he plainly achieved no such thing. It seems the BEA are wondering whether reappearances of the FD bars might have had an influence, but if they did, this merely shows how the poor fellow seemed unable to 'look through the bars' to see and assess the underlying attitude. There may be good explanations for this behaviour, but I am struggling to find them. On the face of it, the question for Air France is whether this skill level is typical (in which case they have a humongous training problem to resolve) or unique to this co-pilot (in which case checking and evaluation needs attention).

One other puzzle, why (as had been noted) does the AP disconnect occur a few secs before the indicated speed loss?

I note Owen Glyndwr's Cm - alpha curves, which suggest that return to normal flight should have been possible. but is it enough just to correct the pitching moment? Don't you have to pitch down to within a few degrees of the actual flight path angle, which in this case, once the full stall (I also don't like calling it a deep stall because that's different) is developed, would mean pushing the nose down about 45 deg? I can't see them having the insight to do that

Would you be able to give us poor old Anglophones a quick summary? I don't like all this secrecy and dancing around the point...

Hi Owain,
Very interesting post, but what about engine thrust maintaining high pitch up with barely no airspeed?
I noticed, from the tracks, that the first nose-down attitude recorded during the stall sequence was achieved between 0211:45 and 0212:00.

During the sequence, the PF was maintaining full elevators deflection (-30°) and, in addition, the THS was reaching -13°. He was also maintaining a full left stick order, but the aircraft rotated to the right in high bank. When it started, the airspeed was for the first time recorded under 30 kt (sensed).

Nonetheless, the pitch came down from about 16°NU to 12°ND!
Vertical Speed increased from -10,000 to above -15,000 ft/mn.

The only other parameter changing (beside the right turn) was that N1 was reduced, at the start of this sequence. N1 decreased in 20 seconds from about 105% (CLB) to IDLE (about 55-60%).

PF had "a very high speed" feeling, released SPEED BRAKE, applied CLB again (105°) and 15 seconds later, the aircraft attitude was nose up again without having gathered that much speed (below 100 kt).

Hi,

Well I have posted before in english .. and it's crystal clear.
Seem's a french man don't understand .. so "par courtoisie" I send him a PM in french
It's not secrecy
I exercise my right to just send a PM to another member
I do not see where there is a problem or some secrets ...
Is there an atmosphere of paranoia on this board ? :)

Not a problem - could you provide a link to where you explained your position?

Not paranoia at all, just slightly confused.

[EDIT : Got it :


I take it your position remains the same?]

Bear, continuous left and right controls and pitch up control tells me he was probably not aviating properly. Most of us believe if he had held pitch and power we wouldn't be talking about this now.

The wild pull up to a nonflyable attitude put it in a deep stall, then they had no clue how to recover from a deep stall so spent several minutes with full nose up SS before impact with the Atlantic.

My students in a J3 cub with three hours knew you couldn't get out of a stall by holding the stick back.

Excuse my intrusion.

As a lifelong dedicated enthusiast (much reading), beside the facts stated, surely one will feel the "fall" (rate of descent, albeit relatively level, in one's belly.)

Was on a 738 in 2007. Felt my guts responding upon descent. Last off and chatted with pilots. Asked about descent and was told it was rapid so as to make up time for the late departure.

Losing altitude at that rate must certainly induce a bodily reaction, which would then inform the brain.

Maybe, under turbulent conditions, one does not pick it up.

....So IF PF had not "felt very high speed..." and could have left his power off for a bit longer (30 seconds, say ?)... Who knows ...

Mike X, no you wouldn't. You could be falling at 20,000 fpm and not know it, you only pick up accelerations - and never believe your senses blind - that's what the instruments are for, and attitude was there...

==============

Of course, when fully stalled, the roll control via ailerons, and even spoilerons, would be weak at best, and possibly even have some reversal effects. The wallowing in roll and lack of definite corrective lateral stick control, should have been a big signal that he was heavily stalled. A glance at the Attitude, at the Trimwheel and...

..but not even once, was the question asked of PNF, even colloquially, 'Hey! D'ya think we're stalled' - or 'Please check, are there indications that we may be stalled' - and all this despite the Stall Warnings.

As with the Buffalo accident, one does wonder whether recent briefings or reading material were foremost in the pilot's minds - that is, tail icing with the former and false stall warnings with UAS in this case, there is a psychology there perhaps, last meaningful imprint takes precedence.

The Airbus was displaying some natural stability tendences maybe, whilst rocking in roll, it was from time to time, dipping its nose... nodding. Either that, or this coincided with PF releasing some of that NU, NU stick pressure. Commensurate, an increase in vertical speed would be expected.

As has been stated so many times before, pitch and power, the basics. Bearfoil's interesting point re waiting to see how the aircraft reacts after auto dropout is worth considering.

More like... PF heard a 'different' airflow sound, due to grossly high incidence, never heard it before , incorrectly associated it with high airspeed sound ?

What is 'auto dropout' ?

Sorry for any assumption.

'When the automatics leave the party'. :)

Hi,

It was not about this message but about the message with discrypancies about CV's in report 1 and 3
BTW yes my position remain the same about Air France .. suffice to read Vienna and Montreal conventions rules for know who bear the responsibility in such event

Mike,

Lots of peeps have mentioned the initial response to A/P disconnect, and PJ2 having direct experience of the type, went to some trouble a while back explaining his approach, and the whys and wherefores of leaving alone as far as possible as there may be better things to be doing, although establishing wings level may indeed feature

Sure, a brutal right bank increasing to 40° while full left stick was maintained continuously for 50 seconds, and a sharp pitch change of -28° nose down while full aft stick was maintained continuously for 40 seconds, is certainly related to aircraft stability when stalling with no speed worth to be mentioned.
But what changed the previous equilibrum (16° NU, TOGA, continuous oscillations in roll) seems to be the sharp reduction of thrust.

No no. PF stick did not move from full left and full aft from ~0211:40 to 0212:15, while aircraft started to pitch down from 16° nose up after 0211:45 and reached 12° nose down in about 10 seconds (0211:55).
PF declared feeling a "very high speed" at 0212:02, and in fact, the aircraft accelerated by ~50 kt but from an airspeed close to zero.

It happened right after the captain came back on the FD. He should have been quite puzzled to see the horizon moving down and up again to zero, while V/S increased from 150%, with airspeeds/Stall Warnings disappearing (NCD) and reappearing (valid)...
TOGA put the aircraft back in stable attitude, close to zero pitch for a while and wings could be put barely level again.

As flattering as it is to be confused with PJ2, My remark had to do with PF's first input after a/p loss.

With NOSE UP, (and LEFT ROLL), if PF was impatient for NU response after initial pull, he may have accentuated it with more pull. The a/c is heavy, and having taken manual control in these conditions w/o alot of experience (did anyone?), his exaggerated pull may have caught the airframe responding, and been responsible for the 1.6 gee rotation?

The traces tell this?

Visibility of pf actions
 

Long time lurker, retired intelligence analyst. Not a pilot but I am trained to think out of the box and approach issues laterally.

I would like to take up more explicitly the suggestions that a few others have made about the visibility of PF actions with the sidestick. I do think care needs to be taken in considering this factor. Unfortunately, it perhaps has become a taboo or “jump over” issue because of unproductive AB vs Boeing arguments, and it has tended to be quickly dismissed in this forum. Similarly I do not see it picked up in explicitly in the BEA reports.

But it seems to have been a significant factor in this accident at two points, both the incident start and subsequently in the cockpit in finding a resolution

My understanding of the operation of a two person crew in aviation is that the PNF should monitor the actions of the PF and express views and act when appropriate. In this case we had a relatively inexperienced crewmember as FP and the most experienced person on type as PNF. However the PNF does not seem to have been privy to the sidestick actions of the PF, so that his checking role was stymied. Similarly the Captain when he arrived at 2:11:43 could not see the sidestick actions.

2:13:40
PF: Mais je suis à fond à cabrer depuis tout à l’heure
Capt: Non non non ne remonte pas

The BEA is undertaking a study with psychologists and psychiatrists but I hope it gives consideration to the reactions of the PNF and Captain given the incompleteness of the information that they had regarding sidestick operation. Did they automatically tend to assume the sidestick was being handled in the way that THEY would have handled it, or did they tend to omit a focus on sidestick operation because it was not visible?

What I am getting to a need for a simple panel display so that both pilots can easily view the sidestick operation. For example, a simple color display showing one or two of the following colors as appropriate: blue (up), orange (down), red (left), green (right), white (neutral). This should inform and hopefully empower the PNF (and anyone in the 3rd seat) to the necessary degree.

A number of incidents come to mind in this connection. Of course, the availability of a yoke didn’t ultimately save EgyptAir 990 or Silkair 185. There was an earlier suicide attempt with JAL 350 (DC8) in 1982 on landing approach. I understand that in that case PNF grabbed the yoke and forced it back, reducing the crash impact and allowing the majority on board to survive. I also wonder with AirBlue 202 whether a sidestick display could have given PNF a few more seconds to realize what was happening. Visibility of sidestick actions will surely be an issue from time to time in the decades ahead.

It seems that autothrust reduced N1 from ~100% down to 85% just before disconnection (reduction caused by turbulences or Mach selected, diconnection by UAS) and it stayed there until it was unlocked by the pilots (~0210:25 -> CLB).
This caused at first a pitch down of about 3°, down to zero or slightly below (~0210:00 - 0210:05)... which could have delayed the aircraft response to PF NU orders.
Thrust increased to CLB between 0210:25 and 0210:35, from 85% to 100+, it would have added some pitch up before the PF tried to reduce aircraft V/S.
N1 was reduced again to 85% at 0210:45, quickly followed by TOGA after 0210:51 (at second stall warnings sequence).

At AP disconnection (0210:05), she started wings level and she rolled to the right at 4° per second, before first PF imputs two seconds later.

I wonder if there is a software routine that could have detected the stall that the pilots were unable to? High AOA, sufficient thrust, yet altitude is decreasing steadily for a long period. (Have the computer do the instrument scan and suggest action.) I still think training and new procedures are required to get crew back to being active pilots. If I am on a passenger flight, I sure hope the folks up front have had a crusty instructor pilot throwing everything at them so that the right scans, observations, and responses are learned and quickly applied when things go awry.

"My students in a J3 cub with three hours knew you couldn't get out of a stall by holding the stick back''

If you ever did fly with this kids some of training programs only wants you to teach them how to recover on the first sign of stall then you got to teach them how to fly jets in pistons...

mm43 I read the ATHR disconect 2 sec later 2:10:07

in the acceleration we can seperate two different parts IMO, the average value and the short peaks

the average value will corespond to the main movements of the heavy airbus, the shorter peaks shows the turbulent influence

between 2:10:07 and 2:10:17 the average acceleration get up from 1.0 g to 1.3 g (and fall back to 1.0 g in the following 10 sec) I think this is caused to the elevator move to -1.0 deg (the pull by the PF) also the g-protection can play a rule here

but the acceleration peaks in this time ( 0.8 ...1.6.....0.85 .......1.5 g) indices strong up and down drafts

this are followed by changes in AoA ( 4....2.....5....2....6) and the stall-approach-warning worked perfekt ("stall" if AoA>5.8 deg)

but I think that the air flow over a wing even with this higher AoA will not break down so fast, (flow-seperation needs his time)

so the wing with AoA=6 is still not in a stall, but with this speed he create a very strong lift and can create strong momentes

my read is that the turbulences can caused a lot of this first pitch up......

Yes, no doubt about that, and I'll fix the graphic. Thanks.

Hello, HN39;
Yes, I agree with your assessments concerning conditions just prior to AP-A/THR disengagement.

On your question regarding disengagement of the AFS, I suspect that the AP - A/THR disengagement occurred two seconds before the loss of airspeed because the Mach parameter dropped to M0.30 for one sample, two seconds prior to the CAS dropping and the engagement conditions for the AP-A/THR-FD systems were temporarily not met.

On the flight conditions, aircraft response etc, in my view the variations in roll, pitch and engine thrust would be considered minor and common in light to more than light turbulence. Even in moderate turbulence at altitude, manual flight in Normal Law is not a problem. I haven't done it in anger in Alternate Law but in the simulator it is a non-issue but as I've mentioned, one has to be gentle. I think the control inputs by the PF were exceedingly brisk and resulted in the 1.5g initial vertical accelerations. But eight-degrees of roll in two seconds, (as noted in the BEA Report's graphs near the beginning of the Report), is not in itself a "control" issue, nor is the slight pitch down then recovery by the autoflight system just prior to disconnection.

What I wish to convey here is, with a loss of auto-flight capability, one simply flies the airplane, maintaining stable flight while sorting out why the system disconnected, then reconnecting when re-engagement conditions are met.

On why the PF's seatbelt may not have been fastened at impact, I believe Mr. Optimistic commented earlier that the PF may have been preparing to get out of his seat to let the captain in. I think this is a reasonable conclusion to draw at the moment - I can see something like that occurring, but of course there is no evidence thus far to support this suggestion.

Hi,

I don't think this is a reasonable conclusion ....
The reasonable (and logic conclusion) was that the captain take place in the left seat (due to his qualifications and common usage)
It's certainly the first place to go who come to his mind if he want to take command
In the CVR report .. nothing (not a word) about captain to take command.
If this was the case .. sure the BEA had reporting the wordings .. as it is a important event ...

Thanks for enlighting / correlating the facts, HN39, much easier to read (for me) :)
About the AP discon : AP2 was engaged, it's based on the right side "chain" (pitot 2, ADR 2, IR 2, EFCS 2...) unless I'm mistaken. My guess is that the pitot #2 was the first to freeze, the first to give an value dropping, unmatched with the 2 other speeds (ADR1, ADR3).

@ bear (post 1115) : I'm ready to accept other causes than UAS/icing... providen an alternative theory shows itself either probable/logical or demonstrated (facts, recordings...)

@ grity (post 1120) : Thanks for the pic with the stick moves, very valuable.

Having lost the IAS due to pitot they then did a zoom climb. This traded their velocity for altitude gain and resulted in the slower speed and stall problem. We can presume that the initial zoom climb was accidental as no additional thrust was applied, no announcement given.
For me this is the most puzzling part of the incident. Perhaps an accidental climb whilst trying to level wings in the chop. But +2500 feet? When instrument scanning you do your utmost to maintain them at the desired position. Corrections are done frequently and in very minor stick adjustments.
When they lost the IAS why did one of them not glance at the ground speed for a sanity check? You have it right there so why not.
They would have seen it change from >400kts to <50kts. C'est une grand problem, non? Perhaps the PAX seat back display would show ground speed change and they could even deduce a stall.
I say this not in cricticism of the pilots, but more as a question of what would I do if I lost my speed. Maintain attitude and power and treat her gentle as egg shells to buy time so my buddy can figure it out and call it in. Keep my scan going because that's all I have. No doubt it is more difficult because of the chop and warnings.
My gut say there is more to the puzzle. However I have a feeling we will never know. How do the more knowledgeable ones here feel about the PFD switch by the PNF and BEA want to record the instrument panel?
I was hoping to get an answer why the PF nosed up so radically. Reading the report 3 it looks like not yet, perhaps not ever.

I agree you have to pitch down enough that the aircraft accelerates. The curves of course only relate to AoA and aircraft trim, but in practice, until the dynamics have sorted themselves out and a new flight path angle stabilised, AoA and pitch move together. I think that when you have pitch down from some steady (stalled) state, the first thing that happens is that the flight path angle becomes more negative at more or less constant AoA, and the aircraft starts to accelerate. This would be a steadily escalating effect I think, so it would not be necessary to pitch all the way down to 45 deg nose down in the first instance. But then I am not a pilot, so perhaps someone else could comment?
The AIAA curves were just tunnel data, so no thrust effects were included. There certainly would be an effect such as you describe, which would depend on altitude as well as airspeed. (Thrust increases with decreasing altitude and decreasing airspeed; the overall aerodynamic moments other than thrust decrease also with airspeed, so the pitch effect from the engines is biggest at SL and low airspeed.
I don't think I agree with the "barely no airspeed" bit. To me it seems that the credibility of the measured CAS is going steadily south as AoA increases and above about 35 deg AoA you cannot believe a number of it. I say this because it seems to me that the position errors are wholly unknown for any AoA above the flight tested stalling value and that when you are looking at AoAs of 30 deg or more coupled with roll and sideslip excursions the 'measurements' are completely unreliable. Where the measured CAS can be relied upon the recorded ground speed converted from TAS to CAS is in pretty good agreement with the measured value (and yes, I am aware of wind effects, but the AI analysis needed only a 15 kt wind correction and this, I assume, would have been 15 kt TAS, so much less as a CAS). If you carry that process forward to the regions where the recorded CAS is crazy you find that the aircraft was fairly close to 110 kts CAS all the way down.
A back-of-an-envelope sum for 110 kts and FL350 suggests that going from Flight Idle (essentially zero thrust) to TO power would add 8 degrees to the AoA. In the only sequence where power was reduced to idle the pitch changed from +15 to -10 but unfortunately one cannot say what effect that had on AoA because the AoA recording has hit the stops, as has the flight path angle recording. If you were VERY imaginative and believed the AoA out of the IRS, you might persuade yourself that the AoA was reduced from about 46 deg down to about 39 deghttp://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/sr...lies/wink2.gif

Hi,

Can gurus explain to a graphics dumb reader ......

http://i.imgur.com/GEJ0Y.jpg

What about the movements of elevator and movements of stick ..
Do you see the elevator mimic the stick commands in the 20 - 30 first seconds after AP tell goodbye ?

Lazy Speech?
 

Since in Normal law it goes where you point it, I guess in the vast majority of cases pitch up equates to going up so I can understand the lack of precision most of the time, but surely if the PNF or Captain did know what was happening (stall)they would have said "push the nose down (or forward)" rather than "Go Down".

1- Can we read anything into PF and Capt's use of Up/Down rather than nose Up/Down that would let us know what they understood the situation to be and when?

2- In a similar situation would explicit references to pitch be more helpful to the PF than saying Up or Down? After all, if I were frightened and could see from the rate of descent that I was going down fast, someone telling me to go down would not be something I would want to hear. A statement of "Get the nose down" might get through to me. (There again "The wing is stalled, get the nose down" would have probably been better still!)

I think of stall recovery as being like turning across the slope on skis, you know the theory, but the first time you turn back towards the fall line and it gets worse before it gets better, most of us fall on our backsides.