Training is a Red Herring. With faulty probes, anomalous solutions, unquantified, and unbriefed, UAS is NOT a Training issue.

It is a BRIEFING ISSUE, and an Mx one.

Smoke, Mirrors.

Thought Experiment
 

Not disagreeing with you on the confusion.

I doubt that a person could make the control inputs that the PF did with just two fingers. He had to have palmed the stick. The forces appear to be too high otherwise.

Here is the thought experiment:

Suppose a pilot in a stall such as AF447 was in, places the stick full aft for a period of time and the THS runs up to its limit. If he now releases the stick and allows it to center, will the elevator center or remain at its last (30 degree nose up) position?

The answer is likely not as intuitive as it seems.
First, the aircraft is going to be in either g maintenance mode or pitch rate mode of C*. If airspeed is invalid, which mode is effective?

Next, doesn't the computer tradeoff elevator deflection for THS deflection. If the THS is at its limit, there is nothing to tradeoff in exchange for decreasing elevator deflection, is there?

Now overlay the aircraft's oscillatory pitch behavior in the stall over the top of this. What happens now?

There goes a shoal of Red Herring right now:}.

iff789 - your last two paragraphs are exceptionally pertinent.

"well, how hard can it be ?" - a few have discovered lately.

When the AP disconnected at 02:10:05, the A/C normal acceleration was 0.85 g (IR#3 p.42), zero V/S and FPA. If the pilot had done nothing, would the EFCS have maintained that level of 'g' (plus or minus variations due to turbulence)?

To trim up in such circumstance must be a pilot's call, not one for the automation.
Let the crew make such a deadly mistake, don't do it for him please.

Now we would need to evaluate both item separately ...

Because trimming to the limit of the AP like in AMS or LGW is not a better idea - AP should give back control before reaching such extreme because autotrim itself should not be allowed to go that far.

I note that limits for the 320 electric trim and manual trim are different.
It is apparently not the case for the 330 ?

I fail to remember reading a suggestion that "recognizing the stall" was a reason for the autrim to be detrimental. It was rather making the elevators NU even more effective, and the elevators ND less effective, and thus making overall a lot more difficult to get out of the stall.

Someone mentioned the stall incident, and recovery of the Tarom A310 approaching Orly, and pilot action on Manual Trim, and I've read that as a case, in which the pilot recognized early that the angle of the THS will affect how he can get out of the stall, and acted on it.

That brings up another problem caused by the behavior of the machine.... They had the Stall Warning sound coming back each time, so under pressure and confusion, they went back to the controls input that silenced that.

The cautionary attitude should not overwhelm the technical understanding of the problem.

I am really curios to see the answer to this. I sense that someone, maybe a group, involved in deciding that, have been asked questions quite a bit by now.

Were the A320 limits on autotrim always that way? Did ever a change been introduced by an upgrade?

Sly, Machinbird. It is not a training issue, per se, insofar as some here are extrapolating holes in ab initio for younger pilots.

STALL recovery needn't be trained in large jets: it is not supposed to occur, and no actual training can be designed for it anyway.

UAS cannot be trained, as in the type experienced lately in Airbus. Witness the meters from AB re: "Don't reconnect AUTOPILOT". "Review STALL procedures," etc. Then, "Wait xxx to reconnect autoflight," etc.

To a large extent, it cannot even be briefed: for 447, it was poorly addressed by both the a/c manufacturer and the line. The Probes issues, though patent, reflect the attitudes present that allowed this crash to happen.

It is NOT established that the PF's initial inputs were NOT an attempt to establish a flight path until speeds returned. How easy to discard this, since everyone wishes to discuss the follow on to this critical event's inception?

Crew were dumped into manual operation abruptly, the jet wanted handling, and it was downhill from there.

Red Herring? How about actively avoiding the discussion to be had re: the onset of Upset?

BEA will be asked to prove the airframe climbed abruptly and STALLED solely as a result of the crew's actions.

I see no such proof. On offer is a gassy spill from Herring merchants.

imo.

Interesting proposition. My initial response is to consider what the aircraft would do longitudinally if in DIRECT LAW.

We know that the CG is forward of the Aerodynamic Center or Neutral Point. That being the case, the Elevators must provide the following:-
(a) The AFT CG position is defined as - 1° of elevator deflection is required to pull a 1g Load Factor, and
(b) The FWD CG position is defined as - the maximum elevator deflection must provide at least the maximum acceptable load factor of 2.5g.

A problem exists in the AF447 stalled situation, i.e. a lack of TAS and faulty CAS, e.g. NCD.

But the aircraft is in ALTERNATE LAW, and the pitch characteristics are the same as NORMAL LAW which seeks a G response to commanded Elevator angle from the SS and as modified by the FCPC. Exactly how the FCPC preconditioning will react with dud air data is the big unknown, but with the aircraft stalled and falling at a nominal 1g, what is known from the DFDR traces is that a reduction of NU Elevator resulted in a reduction in pitch attitude, as would be expected with a CG well FWD of the Neutral Point. Not forgetting the pitching moment resulting from variations in thrust.

So your question - - seems irrelevant, though I suspect what you were asking is, "If the SS was left to center, what would the THS eventually do?"

Apologies if I have misinterpreted your post.;)

At the start of the sequence, the speeds were only out from about 02:10:04 to 02:10:36 - just too long to prevent Alternate Law from latching - but interestingly, they come back well before the apex of the zoom climb is reached (The ISIS speeds come back just as the aircraft reaches the apex at about 02:11:15).

From that point the speed is reliable until the stall is so heavily established that stalled air begins to foul the pitot tubes, static ports and AoA vanes - which coincidentally is when the Stall Warning stops after sounding for almost a minute.

The major THS movement happened while the FCPCs were getting good air data. The resolution of the graph is pretty lousy, but you can see the beginnings of THS movement following the elevators coming down when it was attempted both times - unfortunately neither attempt was held for long enough to make a difference.

My educated guess (and it is a guess, so feel free to take or leave it as such) is that it would have gradually returned to neutral, following the elevator demand. Releasing the stick just after the apex may have been enough for the aircraft to recover itself (being docile in the stall according to the data we have), but within a minute, positive action was required to get them out of it. The nose drops below zero degrees *four times* after the air data goes out for the second (and final) time, but in every case it is hauled back up due to the pitch-up demands coming from the PF's sidestick.

My thoughts are similar, though without receiving any positive pitch attitude command, would the THS return to say 4°NU. Remember, the A/P is OFF and the aircraft will follow SS inputs - which it was doing.

The Pitch Attitude / Flight Path Angle and/or V/S would "ring the bells" in this situation, but surely outside the software designer's criteria.

A330 - Instructor Support Documentation
 

I have previously posted a link to the manual, but following recent requests here again is the link to the A330 Instructor Support Manual

Paradoxical THS
 

If the SS is neutral, the command is for 1 G. The aircraft was stabilized at 1 G in the stall. Why for gosh sakes would the THS have to move at all?

If it did, tending to create a load factor of less than 1 G, a situation Mach' alludes to, the elevator would have to then move NU to maintain the neutral, 'hands off' 1 G SS command.

THS may not necessarily follow SS input direction. Example:

In a dive recovery with the SS full back, load factor will be +2.5 G (1.5 over neutral) if the airspeed is 'adequate' to achieve +2.5 G (There will be, additionally, some MLA control surface action). If the aircraft continues to accelerate in the dive recovery, the THS (and possibly elevator) will bias in the ND direction, opposite the SS input, to prevent the G from exceeding 2.5 as the airspeed increases. This not a ND command, just a reduction in NU to prevent over-G but it is movement opposing the command input direction. Depends on airspeed.

Not that you would get there, but I would guess that if full forward stick were providing -1 G, and if the aircraft were accelerating, the THS would bias in a NU direction to prevent exceeding - 1 G (severe discomfort & nausea not withstanding). :yuk:

(Of course in Direct, instead of Alternate, you can get even more G...in trade for the potential detaching of parts of the aircraft.) :E

After 02:12:30 the SS went through center a number of times, the elevator responded by coming down from -30 to -15 degrees, but the THS did not budge (see IR#3 p.41 for better resolution). FWIW, my educated guess would be that the THS would start to move when the elevator goes past the neutral position (as in Perpignan).

The pitots, static ports and AoA are all on the forward fuselage, not really in 'stalled air'. Some time ago I posted a comparison between the IAS recorded from the ADR's and the CAS calculated from ground speed. The two speeds started to diverge at around 02:11:30. For example at 02:11:43 the values were 100 kIAS vs 133 kCAS.

Right, no G demand equals no movement.

Let's mark that answer as correct!:ok:

As I see it, while stalled at 1g, the elevator position is a demand for a increase/decrease in G which wont be met until the AoA is such that the wing is flying again. The THS will move to supplement the SS/Elevator demand as long as this G request is not being met. Elevator at 0 equals no G demand.

Salute!

I go with Doze on this, plus last para of mm's post

Don't agree with last sentence, as a zero elevator position could result in negative or positive gee depending on airspeed and THS position, otherwise....

From what I read in the FCOM, the THS moves to reduce the requirement to hold back/forward stick. Just like non-FBW planes. So the continued back stick resulted in the THS trimming further and further. I can't find anything concerning THS movement related to measured gee, only stick position.

So I go with Doze that just letting go of the stick may have helped things at the apex of the zoom.

If I misinterpret Lyman I apologise but I rather think he is driving at one of two things. Firstly, a problem with the pitot tubes in which case UAS procedure pertains. Otherwise, failure to follow SOPs - as we know these were not observed. Either way we are left with a human factor issue. The difficult question, why were drills, SOPs and the like ignored? For everything else our shoal of red herrings is now following the trail of clotted cream (and that is a mixed metaphor!).

We mostly agree. I think the autotrim discussion probably merits a thread in itself as it goes much wide than this accident.

Again agreed. In more general terms I fear the industry may have got itself into a nasty spiral:

1. more accidents per hour in manual flying therefore we should use more automatics
2. only times pilots get handed the plane is when George says "something's wrong because we've got to the edge of the envelope, I have limited (no) intelligence and don't know what to do now, so you have control. By the way, that's the stick shaker..."
3. resulting crash happens with human in control and is then another tick in the "mechanics are better than meat" box
4. return to (1)

I've thought for a while that it might even be beneficial if George took a mandatory random bathroom break every flight or so, just to ensure the real pilots are kept excrcised. Ecam: "you have control, I'm off down the back for a pee and to chat up the cute FA, back in 15".

Sadly even if it might be good idea over all, whoever implements it will have blood on their hands and a very unsympathetic hearing sooner or later...

I don't know. I'd really like to see more info on this 320 "limit", in particular where implemented and which laws and on what data, but I've found nothing other than the comments on here so far.

If the 330 SS were released at the apex of the zoom, all else equal, one of two things would have happened:

1. If the existing flight path at the time the SS is released would result in maintaining a speed/AOA in a range out of the stall (speed above, AOA below), then all is well and NO pilot intervention would be required to avoid a stall.

2. If the existing flight path at the time the SS is released would result in a continued decrease in airspeed and a subsequent continued increase in AOA to maintain the flight path, then NU elevator and follow up NU THS motion would occur ‘HANDS OFF’ until which time the pilot would have to intervene to avoid the stall.

This is why I’m a little suspicious of the A320 sim comparison, in which holding significant back stick force was described as a requirement, just to maintain 15 degrees of pitch PRIOR to the stall. Sounds like a low speed stability function of some sort was still in play in the 320?

In ALT2, the A330 would not require any back stick force (i.e. SS could be released to neutral) to hold the commanded pitch attitude/FP, and would do so as long as the aircraft maintained the speed/AOA to do so. Simulations can be ‘right on’ or not, and that’s why the regular evaluations are done using both automated QTG’s, and in the case of stalls (those which WERE done in flight test, i.e. evidently necessary, probably expensive, not terribly dangerous) manual QTG’s are flown to assure the nearest possible fidelity to flight test data that WAS made available.

Further, I would doubt that, once in the stall if the SS was released with the THS at 13 degrees, that the THS would of its own accord just roll back to a position of 3 or 4 degrees, trim positions that correspond to neutralizing the dynamic pressure for a speed range of around 265 KIAS down to around 215 KIAS at 1 G, not 150-180 KIAS and below in a clean config which won’t support a 1 G aero load factor.

If the SS had simply been released in the stall at 40+ AOA and 1 G, what 1 G unstalled flight path does anyone think would have eventually been achieved with the aircraft referenced acceleration already around 1 G and on a current flight path headed steeply down hill with dynamic pressure quite a bit less than that at 215 KIAS and above? ‘Splain it to me please. :)

Without getting too excited, nor eliciting same from partisans, I believe the Pilots were not aware the airframe was STALLED.

Much of what we see in the BEA data supports this. There were insufficient cues to provoke a STALL RECOVERY, unless one certifies that TOGA and PULL qualify. Know the machine? Eh, Carthusian?

Erm, without question, and that means exactly, what? This flight?

This entire thread is peppered with assumptions of superior skills to this crew, which I find frankly repulsive, and quite literally, unsupported.

There is a soft bottom line, of course. To me, continued questions and a resistance to knee jerk pronouncements, plus an unwillingness to eliminate even a remote possibility, is preferred.

airtren, Without THS in the ascent, wouldn't the STALL have precipitated a Break that could have been recognised? Instead of a slide to mush that deprived some critical cueing? Not to mention a sluggish drop of the nose when commanded with FNU THS?

Lyman pontificated:
That's because only a fool would eliminate possibilities until the final report is issued.

Hope this helps.

:zzz:

While there is a lull in the current aerodynamic discussion, an Airbus initiative on future FDR options has been published in the August 2011 edition of FAST TECHNICAL MAGAZINE-#48. In light of the difficulty in locating AF447, the options they are exploring for pre-crash alerting, jettisoned ELT and floatable QAR devices are touched on. Well worth a look.

NOTE: File is a large PDF - 9MB

There are those here who reject other than PE as the procuring cause of this fatal wreck.

I believe the Pilots may have inherited an UPSET airframe, and were unable to recover the flight path, for reasons as yet undetermined. A chorus of 'consensus' notwithstanding, the Procuring cause has gotten virtually no attention, every thing has been a buzz of holier than thou judgment. Pontificate? As in: "These imbeciles?"

At the end, it is likely no complete certainty will be reached. There will be questions left, it is common.

A finer point for you? I think you may have misinterpreted my post. I have no inviolate opinion. ;)

@Lyman,
Sorry, I think I may have read it backwards or upside-down. :oh:

Why not :)

Nicely put!

Now that would be a reason to call automation "HAL". The under-tought is interesting :ok: but please don't try to sell it that way :p

ATPL’s should comment rather than people like me, but I would have thought any manual practice in line flying is almost useless if just taking over from AP when in level cruise. I have noted several older pilots talking about taking every opportunity, SOPs etc. permitting, to do descents, climbs, and other things that are more active, to keep current; and deploring the modern tendency to keep hands off and let AP do it all.

In my line of (office) work, some of us used to query whether somebody claiming years of experience really only had about 1 year, repeated multiple times. I wonder about flying hours the same way (as somebody else here hinted at) – thousands of hours might be mostly thousands of times doing the same sort of hour, letting AP do it all, with actual decision making and manipulating controls being – what? A few hundred?

I would be interested in informed answers to that.

Chris N.

ChrisN, this probably belongs in a thread of it's own, but hand flying a FBW "protected" Airbus in normal law, requires a different skill set than does hand flying a non "protected - normal law" aircraft. That in itself is not a bad thing. I have no problem switching between a simple Cherokee 180 and a FBW Airbus. The skill sets are different and it is quite simple to fly each with the appropriate skill set.

You wrote: I'm not certain what it is you are asking, but I'll attempt to answer the question I perceive you to ask.
The skill set required to hand fly a transport category swept wing turbojet at normal cruise altitudes with no abnormals and in fair meteorological conditions is FAR different than the skill set required to hand fly the same aircraft when said aircraft is turned over to the pilot in an abnormal situation in bad weather. (An additional bit of information you should know is that RVSM rules effectively outlaw hand flying at cruise.) Hand flying the above described aircraft at cruise in optimal conditions requires nothing more than a normal instrument scan and minor corrections. So yes, the skills required to hand fly in optimal conditions would not necessarily transfer to "recovering" the same aircraft when the A/P hands the pilots an unknown and abnormal situation. This is similar to the difference between a normal take off and one that includes a critical engine failure. If you take a proficient single engine pilot (centerline thrust) and put him/her in a light twin and include an engine failure on his first take off, with no previous demonstration or instruction in engine failure procedures, his performance is likely to be unsuccessful.

As mentioned, the skill set required to hand fly our aircraft in an abnormal would be FAR different than normal straight and level. The only solution would be to provide pilots with practice dealing with some of the potential abnormals.

The autopilot on my A320 disconnects at cruise with some regularity. Sometimes I do it myself when my Jeppesen manual bumps the disconnect button, sometimes it's the FO,..... Whatever the reason, the A/P disconnects, you take the controls and then re-select the A/P. Simple. I have never in my career, been handed an aircraft under the following conditions: at night, in turbulence, with questionable instrumentation, and in a questionable attitude. Neither can I think of any way in which to practice such a scenario.

Earlier, Infrequentflyer789 mentioned it possibly being beneficial for the automation to "take a break" on occasion.

In my opinion, that would be of very little benefit, if any. As I wrote to ChrisN, the skills required to deal with an abnormal in cruise are far different than the skills required to take over from a lazy autopilot every once in a while. Allowing the automation to take a break would only provide practice in normals; what the AF447 pilots ( and most of the rest of us, including myself) really need is practice in ABnormals.

Flying versus monitoring
 

Salute!

A very good question, Chris, and it gets to the heart of the matter WRT AF447.

Your observation hits home with this old military pilot who never flew a heavy. And I am sure that 'bird, Retired, Smilin', Wolf and others can chime in here.

Make no mistake, I used the AP a lot when not engaged in a serious mission requirement like air combat or dive bombing or flying formation or in-flight refueling or low level navigation at 200 feet or lower or.... I preached the value of even some crude AP's we had, like the one in the Viper. My other AP's in the Voodoo and SLUF were really good, especially the Voodoo. We could "couple" Otto to the ILS and simply observe and adjust the throttle until field visible. The F-106 could couple Otto to ground radar datalink and actually steer the interceptor to a position that enabled radar lock-on of the "enema" bomber.

The biggest use of Otto was in bad weather and having to plan an approach or calculate fuel required to an alternate or to simply get your act together. Then we had the long haul missions like flying across the ocean while sitting in a small chair with no snack bar or flight attendants, heh heh. Of course, we would have to snuggle up when weather was crappy, and then we had to get within 20 or 30 feet of a big guy to sip some gas.

Our good-natured jibes at the heavy pilots was that we had less hours but more landings. So in 4,000 hours I had maybe 3,000 landings. We also had 95% manual flying, often at the edge of the aero envelope.

So I feel we need to seriously look at the training regimen of the airline pilots. Get them into something capable of stalling and spinning and buffeting and....

Back in the 70's, USAF assigned T-37 trainers to the buff wings so the pilots could actually practice stalls and do some aerobatics. Was a well-accepted program, and was dirt cheap.

later,

I was the painter of the stick movement between 2:10:07 and 2:10 18 at end of juli 2011

please, take a pin or a joystick in your hand and follow the movement, for every sec there is a number on the paint,

it is not so fast, the PF did not rest but he controled his moves, try it !
if you will make (shake?) mayonaise, like jcjeant called this picture, you have to move the stick 10 times faster


http://www.pprune.org/tech-log/44773...ml#post6610311

http://i.imgur.com/X3HIW.png

TT, and Gums, thanks. TT identified the first part of what I was asking about – sorry if I did not express it clearly enough, but you got there.

(I know amateur gliding is miles removed from flying airliners, but in instructing, once past the essentials, most of the further training is in dealing with the unusual, not seeing once again that the student can fly the easy bits with no problems. I would have thought almost all subsequent checks and training follow that, for power including airliner flying, in sims or reality; and to the extent possible, also in self-imposed currency practice in manual flying. It seems obviously most beneficial if handling the more difficult bits. You confirmed it.)

The other part I was interested in was the “000’s of hours of experience” vs “1 hour 000’s of times over”. (An exaggeration, but I think you know what I mean. Like Gums’s many landings. And I have even more landings per hour than him!) I am not criticising the AF447 PF; rather, if anything, questioning the selection, training and check regime that led him to being at the controls in a situation unprepared for. But just how many hours of his few thousand would have been experiencing new stuff ?

Any guesstimates from those in a position to say?

Chris N.

Grity, I’m glad you posted that again – don’t know how to find the first posting easily.

I tried what you said. I think it serves to confirm something Retired F4 sent to me in a pm (he said I could refer to it here if I wished). He came up with a rationale for what PF was doing, and why.

While I understand F4’s detailed analysis, the amplitude of the SS movements (at M. 0.80-0.82) seemed to some other commentators, and to PNF if I understand his remarks correctly, to be inappropriately large or rapid. Again, ATPL’s and AB drivers particularly would comment better than I could. I know that my much slower glider, like most or all gliders, has an envelope that prohibits full control deflection at VNE or speeds approaching it. I would have thought that some limitation would apply equally to airliners – unless “Hal” protects regardless of what the SS calls for. (Sorry, but I get too easily lost in what still works in alt1, alt 2 and direct. I understand when people spell it out, but can’t remember in between times.)

Chris N

Nice Depiction of the stick movements Grity!:ok: Somehow I had missed this the first time.
Earlier I had noticed a ~2 second period between stick reversals in the BEA data. For a transport sized aircraft, this is very rapid. Mayonnaise stirring for sure when you consider the scale of what is happening with the aircraft. And look at the amplitudes of lateral stick travel!.
PF had to be all tensed up with his mitt firmly around the stick. Probably with his arm not properly supported as well. Hard to keep from pulling a stick back inadvertently under those conditions. (But keep in mind I've never sat in an Airbus Cockpit).

I don't think even with a death-grip on the stick it would be possible to inadvertently pull halfway back without intending to - there's a fair amount of travel involved. But the kicker is that he *slammed it back against the stop* from 2:11:40 to 2:12:15, and there is absolutely no way that could be done accidentally.

One of the things that has occurred to me recently is that with the arrival of big and powerful high-bypass engines 35 years ago, much was made of the "rocketship approach" to things like windshear - which over the years may have been corrupted into a belief that modern engines are powerful enough to get you out of almost anything. This fits with the PF's comments about being in TOGA, in that he may have believed that with the donks at full chat stall was an impossibility. I don't know what kind of groundschool knowledge was imparted to AF cadets, but if the fact that the higher you get, the less effective the engines are was not drilled in then it could have contributed to that kind of misconception. Obviously you have SOPs for things like engine-out in cruise in which descent to a lower flight level is necessary, but were the cadets ever taught why?

You would think, wouldn't you? Sadly, in the US this is not exactly the case. The FAA requires recurrent checking. Not specifically recurrent training. My carrier, as do most others, are loath to provide more than the FAR's require because training is expensive. I take a PC (proficiency check) once a year and a PT (training) once a year, spaced six months apart. Sometimes I take two PC's a year due to pairing limitations in the training schedule.(my training partner may require a PC, a situation that makes us both fly a PC).

A PC is effectively an instrument checkride. In the Airbus, due to it being "stall proof", stalls are not checked. The PC consists of instrument departures, instrument approaches, engine failures on take off, and one or two minor abnormals (such as an airpac failure that leads to an emergency descent), one of the emergencies is usually a engine failure that leads to a fire that leads to an evacuation after landing. This sequence has not changed for me in over twenty years. Effectively, I re-take my ATP checkride over and over again. It's like the Bill Murray movie, Groundhog Day.

The PT I am scheduled for once a year usually consists of PC practice (engine failures at V1, for example) and instruction on a particular procedure (such as a specific arrival/approach/missed approach into a particularly dangerous airport. Guatemala City or Bogata, Columbia for example)

In summary, there is very little time to train things like high altitude stall recovery, and since it is not required, the airlines don't desire to spend the time(money) to do so. To my carriers credit, they did include the UAS/ADIRS failure procedure in our PT's last year. But we trained it once and I don't expect to see it again in the near future. This last PT, I spend a great deal of time taxi-ing around in significantly reduced visibility which is actually good training because runway incursions have killed more pax than Airbus UAS events.

The only answer I see to the problem would be regulatory. The international aviation industry regulators must demand that the carriers provide realistic training in a wider range of abnormal system and aeronautical events instead of focusing on things that were pertinent in 1966.

Hi,

DW
but were the cadets ever taught why?
Well if it's not taught in a flying school (different power effect with altitude) .. this will demonstrate that the schooling level in Françe is very low
It's just a physic principle you (normaly) learn in teenagers school level :)
I wonder if .. at end .. the famous "concierge" will be better choice for Air France than those cadets ...

Salute!

You scaring the hell outta me, Tex.

How much of your checkride was engaging and disconnecting Otto?

Upsets?

Mach buffet versus basic turbulence versus approach to a stall?

The basic Airbus design seems robust, and we have all seen great examples of the airframe and pilot skill such as Sully demonstrated.

My point is that I am not worried about basic profiles and even emergencies such as loss of an engine or such. I am more worried about lack of basic airmanship when Otto quits and the crew has to coordinate, communicate and such.

I sure hope that all the airline pilots look at the AF447 example and demand better training for those 1 in 10,000 times when something goes wrong.

Dozy, In my opinion the reason for the stick against the stop after the stall had nothing to do with the earlier nose up inputs seen in Grity's graph. The post stall nose up was an effort to control the nose bobble in the stall. You can see clearly when PF changes his strategy in the BEA stick position charts.

The early nose up inputs have to be the result of an improper (palmed) stick grip. Do you see the NE-SW orientation of many of the motions? These indicate (at least to me) that PF was controlling the aircraft in roll with wrist flexion instead of rotation.
When he had to get to the far left corner on the chart, he was probably pulling his elbow off the rest also. Looks like the "Death Grip" on the stick was going full blast from the beginning. He wasn't at all relaxed.:uhoh::eek:

Maybe they should put force transducers inside the stick to measure the "squeeze" on the stick. That might tell the psychologists a lot about a pilot's mental state.

Gums, I'm not in the training department, therefore I don't keep up with the specific FAR's. So this is from memory.

A standard FAR 121 Captains PC consists of: Low vis taxi, normal takeoff and area departure, airwork (stalls, steep turns, etc - the stalls are not required in the Airbus), one arrival, one normal precision approach, one single engine precision approach, one non precision approach, one missed approach, one CAT II/III approach (if CAT II/III approved) one V1 cut, and one emergency. The only times the A/P is required to be off are: one single engine ILS, and by at least MDA -50ft on the non-precision approaches. I'm probably missing something here, but for now I think you get the picture.

The only time we get training is in initial. After that, due to constraints of money, they give us the minimum, which consists of checking only. Occasionally we focus on something like the UAS/ADIRS, but that is the exception not the rule. I'm sure a training dept member will be able to give more data, but rest assured that we are given the little more than FAR mins. The same goes for recurrent ground school. It's now down to three days. One day on systems, one for GOM/FAR issues, and one for hazmat/security/etc. My current airline is my fourth and I must say that only one of the four actually provided me with thorough training in the airplane and on the ground. Interestingly enough, that carrier trained in the airplane (B1900) instead of using simulators.

It is my opinion that the US Airline companies rely more on the accumulated skill and experience of the Captains corps than they do on providing good training. IOW, they assume the Captains will give the FO's "on the job training" and that practice will continue from one generation to the next. This was likely good practice when the Captains were mostly military trained, but in the last 20 years the amount of ex mil pilots has dwindled. For the record, I am not military, but am well enough educated to recognize that the military produces/produced well trained pilots. I personally benefited greatly from flying with retired USN pilots early in my career. Unfortunately, historical accident statistics don't prove the past to be any better than the present. But I believe that to be an anomaly. Technology has improved safety, and has tempted airline management to hire less qualified pilots. When you mix a well qualified, well trained, well educated, well experienced pilot with technology in an abnormal situation you get the Miracle on the Hudson. Sadly, that generation of pilots is rapidly retiring.

Edit: One more thing, I am truly saddened and amazed by the number of pilots who chalk the AF447 accident up to nothing more than pilot error. I don't want to be seen as breaking my own elbow patting myself on the back, but I talk about this to everyone I can get to listen and most of them really can't conceive of it being anything other than a screwed up pilot. I personally believe the cause is much deeper than the pilot not knowing how to get out of a stall.

Agreed completely, Machinbird. Like you, I see evidence (in both the control handling and CVR transcript) that the PF seems to have changed his mental picture (perhaps because he never found one that fitted with the plane's behaviour?).

IMHO the clearest example of incompatible actions for a single mental picture, are him mentioning TOGA (perhaps stall avoidance was in his mind then?), and at another time the "crazy speed" comment and (brief) deployment of the speedbrakes.

Therefore I believe comparing his actions at different times, to try to produce a consistent theory (or to try to disprove an explanation for one handling or another) is unfortunately futile, as his mental picture of the situation (and hence the reason for comments & control movements at each point) was likely varying throughout the event.