littlewheelinback wrote:Once they entered the deep stall they were probably cooked. Air France has put some of their experienced pilots through this situation in the sim and the results weren't good. It is possible to recover from a deep stall in some t-tail sweptwing jets, but it is fairly difficult even for test pilots who are expecting the situation. A third officer, with alarm systems going crazy, in a severe thunder storm, at night....

Rest in peace for all souls aboard.

D

Littlewheel,

As I understand it, according to the press reports, the Air France officials say that the sidestick was run full aft to the stop all the way down to the water. The sidestick was recorded to have been kept in that position for three and a half minutes, from initiation of the climb at FL350 up to FL380 when the stall began, then all the way down to sea level

I'm not sure that I understand what a "deep stall" is or is supposed to mean. But if a "deep stall" means flying with full up elevator until you crash, then I understand it. One has zero chance of recovery if one operates the elevator in that way on any aircraft, whether J2 or A380, and whether inside a T-storm cell on or a bright CAVU day with no turbulence - right?

This crash seems to have been caused primarily by pilot error in the face of an inflight emergency with partial panel and sufficient indications of aircraft performance (pitch, power, altitude, and GPS groundspeed) to have recovered from the initial emergency (when the autopilot kicked off), and does not appear to be due to any aerodynamic performance defects of the Airbus.

A deep stall is when the air flow over the elevator is disrupted by the wing. The elevator on a t-tail can be "in the shadow" of the wing and have no effect what so ever. Once this condition is reached the elevator position is irrelevant because it has no airflow to effect. What I was trying to point out was that once they entered this condition it was unlikely that they would recover.

The third officer was in extreme turbulence, without airspeed instruments, at great altitude (where VNE and VS1 are only about 40 knots apart), with all his systems shutting down at once (causing great distraction). The crew was trying to slow the aircraft for the turbulence when the airspeed failed and caused all auto pilot systems to shut down. He had to fly the aircraft by pitch (attitude) and power settings. The crew was probably distracted enough by the system failures that they let the aircraft continue to slow (it would only take a momentary lapse under these conditions) and enter the stall. Without instrumentation I doubt there was stick shaker or stick pusher in effect and so very little warning. These fly by wire AC have no feel to them either.

I can agree that a pilot should instinctively push the stick when in a stall. However, the aircraft they were flying and the conditions they were in are nothing like the kind of flying we GA pilots are familiar with. They may not have even known they were in a stall (they never verbalized that possibility) and even if they had it might have been too late. In simulations this same scenario has fooled and trapped some very experienced pilots.

littlewheelinback wrote:The third officer was in extreme turbulence. They may not have even known they were in a stall (they never verbalized that possibility)

I have read a bunch of reports and didn't see any extreme turbulence. I could have missed one. Didn't know they were in a stall?? Hello VSI-10000FPM That's one hell of a sinker.

How many crashes have we read about because the pilot stalled it. FLY! it all the way to the crash! That means keep the damn wing flying.

Good day

Cowboy wrote:The autopilot fails, the Pilot Flying grabs the stick and intentionally or inadvertently adds a little back pressure, the aircraft begins a slow climb, the indicated airspeed begins to rise due to the iced over pitots, the PF increases the pitch a bit more to "slow" the aircraft which increases the altitude resulting in more indicated airspeed. Added to all of the other commotion the "mystery" of the increasing airspeed is really beginning to play with the PF's mind. "Why won't this thing slow down?" More pitch up, more speed. I think that this is how they ended up in that extremely high deck angle and angle of attack and thus the deep stall. Once you get a swept wing aircraft into a deep stall you are in trouble. Corrective action must be aggressive and immediate or you will return to earth just as AF447. I agree that one should, in this kind of a situation, ignore the Mach/Airspeed indicator and fly pitch and power. But if you have never experienced that kind of failure or have been trained to fly that way it may not occur to you, especially if there are multiple other distractions going off at the same time. "You do not rise to the occasion, you default to your level of training" - Barrett Tillman. One of my favorite quotes because it is so true. Train hard.

THIS. Is spine chilling.

Cowboy wrote:The autopilot fails, the Pilot Flying grabs the stick and intentionally or inadvertently adds a little back pressure, the aircraft begins a slow climb, the indicated airspeed begins to rise due to the iced over pitots, the PF increases the pitch a bit more to "slow" the aircraft which increases the altitude resulting in more indicated airspeed. Added to all of the other commotion the "mystery" of the increasing airspeed is really beginning to play with the PF's mind. "Why won't this thing slow down?" More pitch up, more speed. I think that this is how they ended up in that extremely high deck angle and angle of attack and thus the deep stall. Once you get a swept wing aircraft into a deep stall you are in trouble. Corrective action must be aggressive and immediate or you will return to earth just as AF447. I agree that one should, in this kind of a situation, ignore the Mach/Airspeed indicator and fly pitch and power. But if you have never experienced that kind of failure or have been trained to fly that way it may not occur to you, especially if there are multiple other distractions going off at the same time. "You do not rise to the occasion, you default to your level of training" - Barrett Tillman. One of my favorite quotes because it is so true. Train hard.

Ok I remember that is what happens to an iced over pitot. Does the Air Bus really use a ram air type airspeed indicator. If so only 1 no redundancy. This seems odd. Just asking.

Good day

OregonMaule

read up a little before you start making statements about the causes of the crash or what they should have done. There are three pitot tubes on the Airbus and they all froze over within seconds of each other. There is something called a "super cooled" water droplet that is liquid at below freezing temperatures (I know this doesn't exist at the altitudes and conditions you fly at and you have probably not heard of that either, so the pilots shouldn't have had trouble with it as long as they pushed the stick forward)...when these super cooled droplets come into contact with any object (like a pitot tube) they instantly freeze. Within seconds the airspeed indications on the aircraft were gone. Yes, airliners rely on pitot tubes for airspeed indication.

I read they were in extreme turbulence. Of course any thunderstorm that is over 50,000 feet high has heavy turbulence almost by definition.

I am done with this thread. I find myself getting annoyed at the judgment of the pilots actions without looking into the factors and causes. Anymore than I would want an airline pilot with no tailwheel time weighing in on an accident involving a ground looped landing on a sand bar in a Supercub, I wouldn't want to judge this kind of accident without somehow understanding all I can about the circumstances surrounding it.

littlewheelinback wrote:OregonMaule

read up a little before you start making statements about the causes of the crash or what they should have done. There are three pitot tubes on the Airbus and they all froze over within seconds of each other. There is something called a "super cooled" water droplet that is liquid at below freezing temperatures (I know this doesn't exist at the altitudes and conditions you fly at and you have probably not heard of that either, so the pilots shouldn't have had trouble with it as long as they pushed the stick forward)...when these super cooled droplets come into contact with any object (like a pitot tube) they instantly freeze. Within seconds the airspeed indications on the aircraft were gone. Yes, airliners rely on pitot tubes for airspeed indication.

I read they were in extreme turbulence. Of course any thunderstorm that is over 50,000 feet high has heavy turbulence almost by definition.

I am done with this thread. I find myself getting annoyed at the judgment of the pilots actions without looking into the factors and causes. Anymore than I would want an airline pilot with no tailwheel time weighing in on an accident involving a ground looped landing on a sand bar in a Supercub, I wouldn't want to judge this kind of accident without somehow understanding all I can about the circumstances surrounding it.

Thank you for your advice. I am not an expert on airliners. I am an expert on staying alive. I am 90% sure I am done with this thread. I have my conclusions which may or may not be correct and it really doesn't matter.

If super cooled water droplets iced all 3 pitot tubes I guess the 3 pilots had all 3 pitot heats turned off. I do know about SLD I live in the NW by the mountains and we have SLD, nasty stuff.

I don't care what you fly. Trying to fly through or close to a 50000 foot high thunder storm is at least idiocy. It is a worst negligence homicide.

But what do I know. I'm just a 52 year old dude who fought fire for 30 years, raced motorcycles, climbed mountains and a bunch of other dangerous stuff and am alive to talk about it. "A man has got to know his limitations" Clint Eastwood I think. I know mine pretty well. Knocking on wood now!

I have learned by reading here on BCP that some pilots will fly through any weather for money, to deliver soda, cigarettes, people and what ever else. I have heard all kinds of reasons for doing so. Most I don't agree with. IMO.

I feel sorry for the 228 people who trusted Air France. To save a Euro Air France killed them.

Airlines should not be flying in those conditions. I don't care how much money they lose. The pilots should have training that requires hand flying at all altitudes in which they will operate.

I don't think the 3 pilots had good aeronautical decision making. Flying through extreme TB and TS and the Captain says I think I'll go take a nap. Yep uh huh.

Go ahead, defend them all you want!

Good day...Rob

An American pilot claiming to be the "most experienced A330 Captain in the world" (as confirmed by AvWeb) has already stated that he is unsure anyone would have recovered the aircraft from it's condition. As far as I know, it is quite normal for multi crew cockpits to have the "normal" El Capitano leave for a bit of shut eye and only return when called upon or as scheduled. I would rather not blame AF, who isn't exactly known for killing wads of people with inexperienced, under-trained sheepskin warmers at the controls. A 330's are pretty proud airplanes and after reading pretty much all the junk that has been pumped all over the globe about this accident, it's probably just fine to be sad for the dead people and those they left behind. The pilots sure didn't sit there yelling "Lets see how we can screw this one up" but did what they were trained to do.

Long haul...

...International crew are supplimented by additional crew member or members. Everyone takes a crew rest and the time is divided up rather equally. The captain determines when and who takes their crew rest. That is how crews try to stay rested for the long flights....some of which are in excess of 15 hours non-stop. Don't forget the pilots traveled to work that day and were on duty nearlly two hours before leaving the gate.... with taxi times and departure delays of one or more hours prior to takeoff not unusual. International pilots have often been awake for 24 or more hours before they land. Obvious need for crew rest periods enroute.

Most airlines just staff a second copilot who rotates though the seats while one of the other pilots rest. Some airlines have double crew for the ultra-long haul flights...two captains and two first officers. but that is not the norm.

I've been in a deep stall at 34,500 ft. in a T-tailed jet airliner and lived to tell about it. Believe me one is helpless until and IF one "falls" into more dense air. In our instance we fell from 34,500 to 23,000 ft. before beginning to gain airspeed and slowly regaining elevator/stabilizer control. No stall warning, no elevator/stabilizer control at all....max power, yoke slammed against the instrument panel.....nothing. Just the nose pitched up 20 degrees.... stall buffet walking back and forth on the wing and the airplane skaking like an old wet dog.

And...that was smooth air, daytime, VFR conditions.... in a low tech airliner with everything working. I would not have wanted to be in the cockpit of Air France 447.

God Rest their souls.

Bob

From AVweb
http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archives/a ... tml#205304

AP: Pilots "Forgetting How To Fly"

The airline industry is suffering from "automation addiction," Rory Kay, co-chair of an FAA committee that is examining pilot training, said in an Associated Press story published on Tuesday. "We're seeing a new breed of accident with these state-of-the-art planes," said Kay. "We're forgetting how to fly." Pilot skills have been cited by investigators in two recent major accidents, the Buffalo crash of a regional airliner in 2009, and the 2009 Air France crash of an Airbus A330. How pilots respond to the sudden loss of automated aircraft systems "is the big issue that we can no longer hide from in aviation," Bill Voss, president of the Flight Safety Foundation, told the AP. "We've been very slow to recognize the consequence of it and deal with it."

Voss said the solution will require changes in cockpit procedures, not just in training, where pilots spend just a few days a year. Paul Railsback, operations director at the Air Transport Association, told the AP that airlines are aware of these issues. "We think the best way to handle this is through the policies and training of the airlines to ensure they stipulate that the pilots devote a fair amount of time to manually flying," Railsback said. "We want to encourage pilots to do that and not rely 100 percent on the automation. I think many airlines are moving in that direction." Kathy Abbott, an FAA researcher studying these issues, found last year that "pilots sometimes abdicate too much responsibility to … automated systems." She added that sometimes pilots don't get enough practice in hand-flying and will hesitate to take control away from the computer in an emergency.

I had an interesting conversation w/ a captain for a major airline that flies both Boeing and Airbus heavies.

He said he had a hard time transitioning from Boeing to Airbus because the AB "joystick" did not provide any tactile feedback while Boeing has engineered yoke resistance into its fly by wire system so the controls feel something like you learned to fly with.

I HAVE NO IDEA IF THIS WAS AN ISSUE, but when your instruments go TU and you are getting no feedback from your controls I am not sure what the pilot is supposed to fall back upon.

TD

TomD wrote:I had an interesting conversation w/ a captain for a major airline that flies both Boeing and Airbus heavies.

He said he had a hard time transitioning from Boeing to Airbus because the AB "joystick" did not provide any tactile feedback while Boeing has engineered yoke resistance into its fly by wire system so the controls feel something like you learned to fly with.

I HAVE NO IDEA IF THIS WAS AN ISSUE, but when your instruments go TU and you are getting no feedback from your controls I am not sure what the pilot is supposed to fall back upon.

TD

Very interesting! My friend Joe is in the same position as this captain and say's the same exact thing about the differences in both aircraft you mentioned about Tom (B737 and Airbus 319 & 320). He always say's that he much prefer to fly the B737 over the Airbus's because he likes to hand fly the B737 when he can (initial climb/descents/landings). Was the pilot you talking to fly for US Airways?

I think very few of us on here are qualified to judge the pilots or their actions. I know absolutely nothing about flying big planes. My brother is a retired Air Force pilot and he told me there were times when he flew into London's Heathrow Airport and never saw the ground till they went out to the parking lot. Apparently these big boys will land themselves. He said once they touched down a car with a light on a pole would come out and they would just follow the light. That's putting an awful lot of Faith in technology!

I think Airbus threw the crew under the bus. According to the BEA (Europes NTSB) the crew recognized the stall and when they applied max power the horizontal stabilizer moved from 3 degrees nose up to 13 degrees nose up (nearly full nose up) this would have made it nearly impossible to lower the nose at all.

Also according to the BEA report 41 seconds before impact both pilots were pushing full nose down. The stab remained at 13 degrees until impact. At impact both pilots were still commanding full nose down.

From the voice tapes it is clear that the Captain gave the proper commands and the crew did in fact respond properly.

This is not the first time that Airbus auto flight systems have caused aircraft to crash.

OregonMaule wrote:From AVweb
http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archives/a ... tml#205304

AP: Pilots "Forgetting How To Fly"

The airline industry is suffering from "automation addiction," Rory Kay, co-chair of an FAA committee that is examining pilot training, said in an Associated Press story published on Tuesday. "We're seeing a new breed of accident with these state-of-the-art planes," said Kay. "We're forgetting how to fly." Pilot skills have been cited by investigators in two recent major accidents, the Buffalo crash of a regional airliner in 2009, and the 2009 Air France crash of an Airbus A330. How pilots respond to the sudden loss of automated aircraft systems "is the big issue that we can no longer hide from in aviation," Bill Voss, president of the Flight Safety Foundation, told the AP. "We've been very slow to recognize the consequence of it and deal with it."

Voss said the solution will require changes in cockpit procedures, not just in training, where pilots spend just a few days a year. Paul Railsback, operations director at the Air Transport Association, told the AP that airlines are aware of these issues. "We think the best way to handle this is through the policies and training of the airlines to ensure they stipulate that the pilots devote a fair amount of time to manually flying," Railsback said. "We want to encourage pilots to do that and not rely 100 percent on the automation. I think many airlines are moving in that direction." Kathy Abbott, an FAA researcher studying these issues, found last year that "pilots sometimes abdicate too much responsibility to … automated systems." She added that sometimes pilots don't get enough practice in hand-flying and will hesitate to take control away from the computer in an emergency.

OreganMaule,

It never fails to amaze me that the "powers to be" ignore reality for years and then suddenly come to the appropriate conclusion decades later. This"old hat" pilot and his contemporaries understood the relationship between technology and basic pilot skills as airliners began to seriously automate over 30 years ago. But everyone in position of authority just laughed at us, called us dinosours and bought into the snake oil being promoted.

I spent the first 14 years of my career with a small airline which had 50 DC-9/MD-80 aircraft. During my airline's 36 years of existance we suffered only one "act of God" fatal accident..... despite flying from 6 to 13 legs per day and making millions of take off and landings. Our safety record was second in the nation. Second only to the original Frontier airline which never had a fatal accident in it's 35 year history. Our pilots were aviators first. Stick and rudder guys who could match the skills of anyone in the industry. In 1986 we were bought by and merged into a major airline with a vast domestic and international network. It was a great airline with a glamorous history: flying many B-747's, L-1011s and the like. None the less it's pilots were trained to use and rely upon automation to a far greater extent that my original employer. Within a few months of combining the pilot groups....as we all progressed through training and check rides an accurate and very telling observation became a common mantra of the training center.

"When the pilots from "big airlineA" get into trouble....they turn on the automation." "When the pilots from the "small airlineB" get into trouble...they turn the automation off." A more true statement could not have been made. Animosity between the two pilot groups lasted for years. But everyone from the Vice-Pres. Of Flight down to the junior line copilot always admitted....."never met a pilot from that SMALL AIRLINE that couldn't fly!"

Well 15 more years passed, another merger occured and I found myself flying B-767s for what was the world's largest airline at that time. During my first days of training with the newest employer we were treated to a training film . During the training film the Vice President spoke of today's airline pilots(2000 era) as being....CHILDREN OF THE MAGENTA LINE. Magenta line is that little navigation line that will lead you any where in the world for which it is programed. The pilot doesn't have to have the foggiest notion of where they may be. It will take you there. The automation will fly the airplane and land itself in zero/zero conditions with minimum pilot inputs and programming. The Magenta Line, as a nomenclature, has become synomous with automated aircraft and robotic pilots.

The Vice Pres. warned.....CHILDREN OF THE MAGENTA LINE are making burning holes in the ground all over the earth." "Guys CLICK..CLICK..... turn off the autopilot, turn of the autothrottle.....fly the damned airplane!!!"

I nearly stood up and cheered! No one had to convice me. Despite a long career flying many sophisticated airliners, including those with full automation capability, I hand flew almost all of the time below cruise. I made all manual approaches and landings without use of the autoflight systems on every approach and landing for which automation was NOT REQUIRED. Dinosour indeed!!

Yet even today I was reading on my former airline's pilot union discussion board. The airline has ordered dozens of new B-787s and the FAA has just declared the B-777 and B-787 to be a common type rating, with only 4 days of differences training required.. There was a lot of discussion among 777 pilots about what BS that was and how different the aircraft really were. Then one of the Children of the Magental Line chimed in.......

....."who gives a crap." The 787, like the 777, has fully auto land capability." "Just let if fly itself!"

It has diminised to the point that even many general aviation/airline/military pilots are now willing to forget how to fly and just become..... CHILDREN OF THE MAGENTA LINE.

Rory Kay of the FAA is correct. Where in hell has he and the FAA been for the past 30 years?

Bob

THere was a very close call with a Quantas Airbus A380 coming out of Singapore that had a catstrophic engine failure, which was uncontained, and did substantial damage to the airplane. The captain of that airplane wrote a very interesting description of what it took to get that airplane and it's automation under control, and to get the airplane back on the ground. I can't find the captain's description of the accident on line, but I'll keep looking. It was really telling how overwhelming all the alarms, the automation etc, etc can be in a crisis.

I can't imagine what the cockpit of that A 330 had to have been like as it plunged to the sea. I have a number of Air France pilots who are friends, and who I've flown with in my airplane. Every one of them was a superb airman first and foremost.

But, an old friend, a very senior Boeing 777 captain, said to me: "If it ain't made by Boeing, I ain't going".

Airbus Industrie has the habit of throwing pilots under the bus any time something happens to one of their airplanes. Consider the American Airbus that wound up in Jamaica Bay after the vertical fin came off in a wake encounter.

MTV

mtv wrote:THere was a very close call with a Quantas Airbus A380 coming out of Singapore that had a catstrophic engine failure, which was uncontained, and did substantial damage to the airplane. The captain of that airplane wrote a very interesting description of what it took to get that airplane and it's automation under control, and to get the airplane back on the ground. I can't find the captain's description of the accident on line, but I'll keep looking. It was really telling how overwhelming all the alarms, the automation etc, etc can be in a crisis.

I can't imagine what the cockpit of that A 330 had to have been like as it plunged to the sea. I have a number of Air France pilots who are friends, and who I've flown with in my airplane. Every one of them was a superb airman first and foremost.

But, an old friend, a very senior Boeing 777 captain, said to me: "If it ain't made by Boeing, I ain't going".

Airbus Industrie has the habit of throwing pilots under the bus any time something happens to one of their airplanes. Consider the American Airbus that wound up in Jamaica Bay after the vertical fin came off in a wake encounter.

MTV

Yeah MTV,

They said that the copilot who was flying made agressive rudder inputs that snapped the vertical tail off.

Well it comes with the certification testing. Airbus only test the rudder to "full deflection" and then "back to neutral." That is all the FAA and the European equivalent requires. Boeing, on the other hand, test their rudders to "full deflection and then full OPPOSITE deflection" Big difference. Of course any airframe can be overstressed.....but just try to rip the vertical fin off of a Boeing, Lockheed, McDonnel-Douglas, Convair etc. etc.

In addition the AirBus has a less restrictive/variable rudder input system than Boeing and most other U.S. airliners.

Brave new world. My time has passed.

Bob

I fly with a lot of those CHILDREN OF THE MAGENTA LINE, autopilot on at flap retract and it doesn't come off until 400 feet on the approach. I've had several ask me for upgrade recommendations, I have to tell them that I haven't seen them fly yet.

Don't think that was the case with AF447 though.

I've had the same observation of a lot of F/O's since I've been forced off of my beloved 737 on to "Sparkie the wonder jet". 500 ft autopilot ON, 500 feet autopilot OFF. And, as I hand "fly" the bus thru FL240 I've had more than one F/O comment (complain) about my not turning on the autopilot. "Hey, I'm just a mis-placed bush pilot". Then there was the night when a system failure resulted in both autopilots and autothrust failing. F/O - kinda worried, Me - No big. Makes me wonder...

Good on ya Cowboy and Stickman,

Maybe some of those dinosour eggs hatched after all!!

Bob