off topic Airbus A330

[N22252]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

"There was a demon that lived in the air. They said whoever challenged him would die. Their controls would freeze up, their planes would buffet wildly, and they would disintegrate."

Have we advanced technology so far that the fear of the unknown is now a design feature????

[bstocker]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

4 degrees up and 82% throttle and that baby would have flown untill it was out of fuel...

[Tibia]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

bstocker...

Are you suggesting that Basic Airmanship 101 would have prevented the outcome...

Question... When doing my instrument, we used those suction cup devices to hide a 'failed' instrument (steam gauges). What is now used for glass panels ???

Bob

[Box A35]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

.....and don't forget to have the correct mode on the radar selected so the strongest echos are displayed and can be avoided. Fail to do this and it is way easier to fly right into the undesirable areas.

Well, as long as we were talking about the 101 level stuff I thought I'd add that.

[Leo]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

I see in cockpit photo's there are still some steam guages there for basic flight instrumentation. Makes sense that an all glass display system would have some form of backup not dependent on the electrical system. In that case, what ever happened to "partial panel" procedures? They used to get beat into us.

[knot4u]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

The glass cockpit aircraft that I work on all have an independent standby pitot/static system including a pitot tube, static port and steam gages or a three in one small PFD that is powered by the emergency batteries. The no. 1 and 2 ADC's use the same type of pitot tube as the standby. I've only changed 2, and those were due to failure to heat up and were probably 2 years apart and not the same aircraft. Sometimes I wonder which is better, the steam gages or the little PFD in an emergency. During an emergency after 1000's of hrs on the glass transitioning back to round dials might just add stress to an already stressful situation. Luckily the pilots I've worked with have always taken their recurrent training seriously and they work through these situations in the simulator.

[Bob]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

The control columns the on B777 and B787 are conventional and redundant, nothing out of the ordinary.

Nope, 100% FBW. And the avionic computers on the 787 are not isolated from the network the passengers use, so they may even be hackable. Key phrase is MAY be able to be hacked.

Boeing 777

http://www2.cs.uidaho.edu/~krings/CS449/Notes.F09/449-09-27.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_777

Boeing 787

http://wiki.flightgear.org/Boeing_787-8_Dreamliner

http://www.aviationtoday.com/av/commercial/Boeing-787-Integrations-Next-Step_932.html

[AAFO_WSagar]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

Nope, 100% FBW.

I *think* what the OP (Original Poster) was saying is that the control columns are as they always were... it's what happens between them and the controls that is FBW....

[AirDOGGe]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

Yes, at least by "conventional" I believe he refers to the common, interconnected layout of the flight controls used by aircraft over history to this day, whereas moving one controller moves the other.

It's the same arrangement today in the cockpit of a modern fly-by-wire Boeing aircraft as it was with those older machines using cables directly connected to control surfaces, and later models using boosted hydraulics. As our good host pointed out, it's mainly what's between the controls and the control surfaces that's very different today.

IN fact, almost all dual-control planes have interconnected yokes or sticks that move in sync. "Conventional" definitely applies here.



As such, the Airbus cockpit controls would be termed "unconventional", since it's two control joysticks, isolated from each other both mechanically and electronically, are a new concept for large passenger aircraft, if not all civilian planes.

[Bob]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

Sticks, yokes or flappy paddles, it dosnt matter. The planes are flown by the computers. Watch that Nova episode and you will see what I am failing at explaining here.

[shorebird]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

I believe that in this case, the jet had defaulted to alternate flight control logic following some system failures. As I recall, even in alternate logic, the Airbus would still have saved them, if the FO had just release the back pressure on the side stick. He seemed to know that the airplane was in a stalled condition but his control inputs were the opposite of what was needed to recover. Airlines do very little high attitude stall recovery practice in simulators. Most stalls are practised close to the ground, either partially or fully configured for landing. Stall recovery "where ground is a factor" requires a high angle of attack recovery, just as this FO was attempting.

[AAFO_WSagar]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

I was referred to an article which has pretty much "the story" of what happened....

Very sad...

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/aviation/crashes/what-really-happened-aboard-air-france-447-6611877

[Tibia]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

Stall recovery "where ground is a factor" requires a high angle of attack recovery, just as this FO was attempting.

This statement could be a little confusing, considering this flight's AOA was in the neighborhood of 56.5 degrees (+15 on their AI & 41.5 descent rate). The angle of attack still must be reduced, no matter if high or low altitude.

UNLESS, you have a Saturn V attached...

Bob
who wishes an AOA instrument was required instrument on all aircraft.

[AirDOGGe]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

I believe that in this case, the jet had defaulted to alternate flight control logic following some system failures. As I recall, even in alternate logic, the Airbus would still have saved them, if the FO had just release the back pressure on the side stick. He seemed to know that the airplane was in a stalled condition but his control inputs were the opposite of what was needed to recover. Airlines do very little high attitude stall recovery practice in simulators. Most stalls are practised close to the ground, either partially or fully configured for landing. Stall recovery "where ground is a factor" requires a high angle of attack recovery, just as this FO was attempting.

It's just scary to think of.

Could a professionally-trained airline pilot, responsible for the lives of hundreds, as a huge jet that he is in control of is practically slapping him in the face with "STALL!" warnings, actually think and believe "I just pull back on the stick and the plane goes up, correct?"


.


In my time I have met people who, despite all the training one could get, simply could not learn a certain task.

I myself serve as an example of sorts. Despite years of education in Algebra and advanced mathematics, I just couldn't "get it". My mind just doesn't seem to work that way.

But give me a mechanical issue with some machine or device or a requirement for new tooling and I can instantly picture it operating in my head and see the problem or new design clearly. I'm quite good in photography, art and graphics too because of this, areas where a powerful "Mind's Eye" can be a great help. Designing and fabricating new things is what I love to do.

Just don't ask me to do any Calculus or Algebra for you (a little TRIG is OK). I draw the line at doing my own taxes (short- form of course).




In contrast, a former apartment room-mate of mine who was a programmer at H.P. could solve amazing math problems and write code well enough to make a good living from it. Logic and numbers were his forte'...

..., but give him a pencil and a piece of paper and ask him to draw something as simple as a circle, and he would not be able to do it. Some lumpy ovoid would result. Don't EVEN think of asking him to sketch an object sittiing right before him, not even a simple, cartoonish line drawing. His mind always seemed to work in a logical manner of some sort rather than a visual one like mine.

It was as if our brains get "hard-wired" inside as we grow up to be able to excel at certain tasks extremely well at the sacrifice of not being able to do certain other unrelated tasks even moderately reasonable. I notice it in myself and other people too often. Have any of you observed this in characteristic in anyone you have encountered in your time? Maybe a lousy boss or manager who never should have been placed in charge of others?

My point is...

On the same train of thought, there are skilled, trained pilots who have always loved flying, and there are naturally-gifted pilots who I think may have been some kind of bird in a previous life (Bob Hoover would be an excellent example of the latter).....and unfortunately reality says there are also people who don't have the natural abilities of the previous mentioned and have to work harder at earning their wings and operating aircraft. Some of them may have even chosen "Air Line Pilot" as a career path only because it appeared to pay well and looked easier than their other potential options.

Within that last group there are BOUND to be at least one person who just doesn't have what it takes inside to fly a jumbo in an unexpected situation of any sort, training or no training. Their mind goes blank and/or they panic if they have to think or act beyond what they have been exposed to in the classroom. Commercial pilot training schools are great at filtering out people who don't have what it takes, but no filter is perfect.

So...

Could this whole tragedy have been prevented if one Air France pilot had simply chosen a more suitable career for himself?

Or was he more than capable, and any one of his co-workers might have reacted the same as he did in that exact situation, meaning it really could be an Airbus pilot-training issue with these so-called alternate control laws?


Good questions.

.

[shorebird]

Re: off topic Airbus A330

Stall recovery in most big jets is performed as follows:
-At stall recognition, advance the thrust levers to firewall power (to the limit of forward travel)
-Roll wings level if banked
-Insure speed brakes are retracted
-Pitch as necessary to stop any sink. This could mean high AOA up to 20 degrees ANU. The stick shaker will remind you when you're AOA is to high.
Only after the above and the airplane is accelerating and no longer descending, you lower the nose to a pitch attitude that is appropriate for the configuration. Works every time.
This recovery technique is appropriate for most stalls close to the ground, windshear recovery and flight toward rising terrain. Easy to explain here but not always so easy to do gracefully in the sim.