** This was the situation, but the information
was not presented to the Air France 447 crew.
To the designers of the flight control software,
it must have seemed inconceivable.**
Key Takeaways:
The Air France 447 crash exposed severe pilot confusion and failure to recover from a stall, initiated by unreliable airspeed indications and an inadvertent pitch-up by the pilot flying.
The accident highlighted critical deficiencies in pilot training, specifically regarding hand-flying at high altitude, high-altitude stall recovery, and managing unexpected "startle effect" events.
Airbus's cockpit design philosophy, including non-communicating sidesticks, lack of tactile feedback, and hidden information, was criticized for hindering the crew's situational awareness and control.
A key takeaway is the difficulty pilots experience transitioning from highly automated systems to manual control, often being "out of the loop" and struggling to respond effectively to unexpected emergencies.
You’re flying a twin-engine jet transport. The engines are at full power. The wings are rocking, but the heading is steady. The pitch attitude is 15 degrees nose up, but the VSI says that you are descending at 10,000 fpm. The flight director needles command a nose-up pitch.
What should you do?
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Peter Garrison taught himself to use a slide rule and tin snips, built an airplane in his backyard, and flew it to Japan. He began contributing to FLYING in 1968, and he continues to share his columns, ""Technicalities"" and ""Aftermath,"" with FLYING readers.
