Topic: Air France 447, the answer

[charlesoakwood]

[blockquote] What Really Happened Aboard Air France 447

Two years after the Airbus 330 plunged into the Atlantic Ocean, Air France 447's flight-data recorders finally turned up. The revelations from the pilot transcript paint a surprising picture of chaos in the cockpit, and confusion between the pilots that led to the crash.
...

As PM found in our cover story about the crash, published two years ago this month, the data implied that the plane had fallen afoul of a technical problem—the icing up of air-speed sensors—which in conjunction with severe weather led to a complex "error chain" that ended in a crash and the loss of 228 lives.

The matter might have rested there, were it not for the remarkable recovery of AF447's black boxes this past April. Upon the analysis of their contents, the French accident investigation authority, the BEA, released a report in July that to a large extent verified the initial suppositions. An even fuller picture emerged with the publication of a book in French entitled Erreurs de Pilotage (volume 5), by pilot and aviation writer Jean-Pierre Otelli, which includes the full transcript of the pilots' conversation.[/blockquote]

A transcript is in the article.

This is a saddening and maddening read.  If the men had known how to fly by the seat of their pants there quite probably would have been no crash.  As the writer said ending the article, ... <well, it was edited out>,  it was something like - they used to say you have a scare when you fly Société Air, now days it's you take a chance when you fly Air France.  That's a rough translation but the gist is accurate.  

When I flew a lot it was always comforting to know that there was a 99% probability my pilot was government issue.

[Libertas]

Stunning.

We speculated at the time pilot error was likely, but it is obvious it goes beyond that.  People really need to get all their people better trained to fly the types of planes they are required to operate, especially on long haul overseas flights.  More simulator time (beyond "normal" settings!) and a better understanding of different instrumentation readings and alarms.  And as a design flaw perhaps the asynchronous side sticks need to be junked and they go back to yokes.  And having your most experienced pilot available for the most dangerous part of the trip might be a good idea too.

Basically these guys snowplowed from 37,500' right into the ocean, and at that rate of speed its like hitting cement.

What a harrowing end for the passengers.

No chance Claude, I'll pass on Air France!

[Glock32]

I recall reading about Lufthansa pilots being not very enthusiastic about the addition of Airbus liners to their fleet. They prefer the "classic" configuration of the Boeings with center yoke.

[charlesoakwood]

And as a design flaw perhaps the asynchronous side sticks need to be junked and they go back to yokes.

This is nuts.  It had to be a committee decision how else could a tool designed to hinder communication and confuse operators be introduced into design.

[Libertas]

I think that design came out of military applications...a joystick in one hand and a side throttle control in the other...problem is an airliner is not a fighter plane with one pilot, and only one pilot knows what his controls should be doing.  This design flaw has got to go or be made to give feedback to both controls or it is just stupid, as this case illustrates.

[benb61]

And as a design flaw perhaps the asynchronous side sticks need to be junked and they go back to yokes.

This is nuts.  It had to be a committee decision how else could a tool designed to hinder communication and confuse operators be introduced into design.

Airbus came into being in the early '70's, most of their designers were from Dassault, which built mostly single seat fighter aircraft.  Those fighters used side stick controls (state of the art).  It is a logical assumption to think that since they thought that they were designing the next generation of airliner and fly-by-wire (fbw) was cutting edge for fighter aircraft that they would include this in their "better" aircraft.  Since fbw does not require leverage to input commands (like standard yoke style controls) they chose the side stick control (familiarity with the design) and this type of control does not lend itself well to mirroring of inputs.  In other words it takes lots of design and cost to make both sticks react as one.

[charlesoakwood]

I've never flown a fighter but I have stayed at a Holiday Inn and
a blind toad understands that the left side has to be synchronized
with the right side or you go in circles or in the case of these guys,
down. 

It begs the question; What else did these genius fighter designers
incorporate into this bus.  Good you didn't call them engineers, that
would have insulted the good people at Boeing.

[trapeze]

I read that article about two weeks ago. It seemed to me that there was a cascade of errors that, yes, included the hardware and software of the Airbus. But the thing that most impressed me as the overall cause of the crash was the failure of the entire flight crew to employ proper cockpit resource management. The crew was not communicating with each other in a way that would allow them to understand just what was going on. This was most prominent in the fact that it was only a few seconds before impact that the captain and the more senior co-pilot realized that the junior co-pilot was pulling back on the stick for almost the entire time, committing the aircraft to an unrecoverable stall.

Yes, proper feedback through the controls (and the absence of "averaging") would have helped but it really came down to the left hand not knowing what the right hand was doing until it was too late.

The fateful words of doom from the junior co-pilot:

"But I've had the stick back the whole time!"

[BigAlSouth]

I think that design came out of military applications...

Yeah. French military.

The whole world quakes at the thought . . .

[benb61]

Good you didn't call them engineers, that
would have insulted the good people at Boeing.

Thanks for the compliment CO, I'm one of those good people.

[charlesoakwood]

Air France has announced the conclusion of the crash today; pilot error.

They should have read Popular Mechanics, Dec 6, 2011, article http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/aviation/crashes/what-really-happened-aboard-air-france-447-6611877 or better yet come here
for it and enlightening commentary.

[Glock32]

Bill Whittle has one of his typically excellent videos where he refers to this flight, and uses the Airbus design as an example of two basic and competing philosophies: autonomy of the individual vs. subordination of the individual. As Whittle puts it, Boeing goes with autonomy of the individual because it thinks the pilot is smarter than the plane, whereas Airbus goes with subordination of the individual because it thinks the plane is smarter than the pilot. This same competition exists in governance.

Check it out -- http://www.pjtv.com/?cmd=mpg&mpid=56&load=6995

[trapeze]

Or it could just be that the French are congenitally stupid. History seems to back this theory up.

[Glock32]

I'm not sure when it changed for the French. At one time they were not pansies. They did us all a service with Charles Martel.

[IronDioPriest]

02:13:43 (Robert) Alors descends... Alors, donne-moi les commandes... À moi les commandes!
Descend, then... Give me the controls... Give me the controls!

Bonin yields the controls, and Robert finally puts the nose down. The plane begins to regain speed. But it is still descending at a precipitous angle. As they near 2000 feet, the aircraft's sensors detect the fast-approaching surface and trigger a new alarm. There is no time left to build up speed by pushing the plane's nose forward into a dive. At any rate, without warning his colleagues, Bonin once again takes back the controls and pulls his side stick all the way back.

I'm sorry, but if it was me, I'd be giving the background and associations of Bonin a relentless proctology. Maybe that's being or has been done. But no indication of it is included in the article.