Re:The crash of Air France flight 447 (2021)
by sokoloff on Friday August 11, 2023 @12:20PM
(#37090473)
There was a widespread misinterpretation/incorrect belief of the certification rules at the time of that crash.
There is an airspeed, called maneuvering speed (Va), at or below which it should not be possible to use the flight controls to remove parts of the aircraft. (The aircraft should run out of control authority or stall prior to exceeding any load limits [which is well before the removal of parts].) Every student pilot is taught this prior to passing their first knowledge test and checkride.
The problem with that is the certification rules for Va are for a single input, not for a cyclically reversing sequence of inputs (which is what the first officer of AA 587 did).
As the details became clear, this was a big topic of learning for many pilots, including myself. AA 587 was caused by the flight crew, but I don't put it into the "insane pilot error" category.
There is an airspeed, called maneuvering speed (Va), at or below which it should not be possible to use the flight controls to remove parts of the aircraft. (The aircraft should run out of control authority or stall prior to exceeding any load limits [which is well before the removal of parts].) Every student pilot is taught this prior to passing their first knowledge test and checkride.
The problem with that is the certification rules for Va are for a single input, not for a cyclically reversing sequence of inputs (which is what the first officer of AA 587 did).
As the details became clear, this was a big topic of learning for many pilots, including myself. AA 587 was caused by the flight crew, but I don't put it into the "insane pilot error" category.