Coordinated turning stall and spins

I was referring to the same accident but it was years since I read the
report. The human factors in the accident (probable heart attack attack,
junior crew member etc) were as stated. The initial cause of the problem
was raising the droop instead of the undercarriage (a). Re-reading the
report, I see it was the autopilot that caused the initial pitch up to
compensate for the loss/change of lift, but it was the pilot who switched
off the stick shaker and the stall recovery system, provoking the fatal
rapid pitch up (b). The design intent of the stick shaker was to ensure
that no pilot ever got into a deep stall unintentionally. The aircraft did
go into a deep stall and, because of the problems associated with its T-tail
configuration, initiating a normal stall recovery wasn't possible because
the elevators had lost their effectiveness in the wing turbulence.

Maybe putting the droops down again would have saved them, and/or flaps
and/or undercarriage.

As in so many accidents (eg the DC-10 at O'Hare), the pilots didn't actually
know what the problem was and didn't have the time or height to find out.


"Robert John" wrote in
message ...
Simon,
Your explanation sounds plausible but bears no relation
to the accident investigation report. As far as I
know, the nose never got high - they would have realised
this, but it did get into the wrong configuration.
They could have recovered if they had (a) realised
the droop was retracted and put it down again, (b)
let the system do it's job (stick shaker warned them
and stick push tried to correct it but they dumped
it) or (c) initiated a normal stall recovery - lower
the nose - gain speed.
They were too slow at every stage of the flight and
somehow got into the wrong configuration, all of which
was 'probably' due to the Captain's partial incapacity
due to a heart attack and the crew not realising the
Captain's problem.
I suspect you were recalling a different incident in
a similar aircraft?
Rob
At 16:06 16 November 2003, Simon Waddell wrote:
In this particular case, they all recognised the airliner
was stalled. The
airliner was a Trident, with a 'T'-tail configuration.
This particular
design (Ibeleiev in common with other T-tail designs)
was able to get into a
stabe deep-stall configration where the nose rises
so high that the
elevators descend into the wing wake and no longer
have the authority to
lower the nose and the aircarft just pancakes down.
Give enough height, I
think it is is possible to use the undercarriage and
flaps to create enough
drag to correct the situation. These poor people didn't
have the height
required.

'Mike Lindsay' wrote in message
...
The final turn stall/spin claims many every year.
Are
we really approaching the problem in the right way?
As an aside it is not just glider pilots who get it
wrong. I recall reading an accident report of an airliner
which had taken off from Heathrow back in the 60's
or 70's. The aircraft stalled at about 3000ft and
hit
the ground in a stalled condition. There were 3 qualified
ATPL pilots in the cockpit, two of them qualified
as
captain on type. None of them it would appear recognised
that the airplane was stalled.
What chance have we mere mortals got if the gods get
it wrong?


Its something to with having 3 pilots. Too many cooks...
But if you are referring to the accident I think you
are, didn't the
enquiry find that the two younger pilots were terrified
of saying
anything to the very senior captain, who was probably
having a heart
attack at the time?

At least we don't get that in gliders, thank goodness.

--
Mike Lindsay