Comment Re:Pilot Proof Airbus? (Score 1) 132
Read the cockpit transcript. The stall warnings stopped whenever the crew member pulled the stick back and made the stall worse. (They stopped because the computer was programmed to treat the ridiculously low airspeed indications as instrument failures and disregard them).
I have. That's not what I read in the transcript.
2 h 10 min 03: Cavalry charge (autopilot disconnection warning)
2 h 10 min 10,4: SV: stall
. .
2 h 10 min 13,0: SV stall
. .
2 h 10 min 41,6: Weâ(TM)re in... yeah weâ(TM)re in climb
2 h 10 min 51,4: SV Stall
(for the next minute until 2 h 14 min 01,7 there are stall warnings)
It has 2 pitot tubes and 1 failed.
This is incorrect:
On 12 August 2009, Airbus issued three Mandatory Service Bulletins, requiring that all A330 and A340 aircraft be fitted with two Goodrich 0851HL pitot tubes and one Thales model C16195BA pitot (or alternatively three of the Goodrich pitots)
Apart from that the aircraft was in perfect condition. The failing pitot tube recovered during the fall, so all equipment worked correctly.
The pitot tubes failed because of icing. There would be no ice when they were recovered so "working correctly" isn't exactly true as the conditions of the accident were not in place when they were recovered.
The autopilot shut off and the computer put the plane into alternate law, where pilots are allowed to do stupid things like stall the plane. The computer had one perfectly working airspeed indicator to rely on, but instead it panicked.
Do you know what happens when one of the pitot tubes fails in these conditions? It give erratic readings. So the autopilot cannot determine which one of the 3 readings is correct. It's not "panicking" if it is meant to do that.