3 ms·

> after descending 500ft in about 18 seconds The article says a maximum decent rate of 4,300 ft/min, so almost 3 times faster than that. They were about 13 sec

by zaroth 8y ago

> after descending 500ft in about 18 seconds The article says a maximum decent rate of 4,300 ft/min, so almost 3 times faster than that. They were about 13 seconds from crashing into the ground if that rate held constant.

sandworm101 8y ago
It sounds far worse than it is. 13 seconds is a huge amount of time. Any pilot would react and correct in a second at most. This isnt some slight drop noticed by scanning instruments. They would have felt this and reacted by instinct. Autopilots off, throttles up, arrest the drop and regain a climb. Over and done within moments. They may have even deliberately let it fall a bit to gain speed, if they thought this might be a stall.
- LitFan 8y ago
  It's not what you meant, but "moments"[0] is pretty a pretty long time in this circumstance. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moment_(time) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moment_(time)
- jessaustin 8y ago
  Please re-read parent. They already had not felt, reacted, or corrected in 18 seconds. If the bells had gone off later, they would have reacted later.
  - kss238 8y ago
    That's what the parent says, and what the BBC inplies, but not what the UK report says. The pilot reacted at 1300 ft. It took another few seconds of falling to recover at which point they were at 928 ft.
    - sandworm101 8y ago
      Which is how i practiced things like apparent high speed stalls, where the indication is that you have speed enough but are still stalling, and so you dont trust the indicated airspeed. If you know your altitude and suspect a stall, you dont pull immediately for fear of triggering another stall. You biuld up some airspeed first. If you have it, you use the altitude.
- technofiend 8y ago
  >Any pilot would react and correct in a second at most. I can only speak to my personal experience and I don't have any sort of advanced pilot's license: I just did the very first one - PP/ASEL. In that course even prior to instrument training I was taught to not fly by the seat of my pants. The way my flight instructor explained it the human body is easily fooled and will quickly adapt to a new normal. So you had as an example a pilot getting used to a slight tilt and assuming this is normal, so they keep correcting for the tilt and worsening their situtation. Even as a lowly PP/ASEL I'd still validate any reaction by reading the instruments before assuming a feeling of falling is accurate. Would that take thirteen seconds? Hopefully not, but it would take more than one. Combined with the idea that airline pilots do less and less hand flying and also have many inputs in the cockpit trying to tell them what's happening and therefore may need a few seconds to integrate all that data and then react with a potentially rusty skill I'd feel comfortable saying a subsecond response seems unlikely.

by zaroth 8y ago

sandworm101 8y ago

It sounds far worse than it is. 13 seconds is a huge amount of time. Any pilot would react and correct in a second at most. This isnt some slight drop noticed by scanning instruments. They would have felt this and reacted by instinct. Autopilots off, throttles up, arrest the drop and regain a climb. Over and done within moments. They may have even deliberately let it fall a bit to gain speed, if they thought this might be a stall.

LitFan 8y ago
It's not what you meant, but "moments"[0] is pretty a pretty long time in this circumstance. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moment_(time) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moment_(time)
jessaustin 8y ago
Please re-read parent. They already had not felt, reacted, or corrected in 18 seconds. If the bells had gone off later, they would have reacted later.
- kss238 8y ago
  That's what the parent says, and what the BBC inplies, but not what the UK report says. The pilot reacted at 1300 ft. It took another few seconds of falling to recover at which point they were at 928 ft.
  - sandworm101 8y ago
    Which is how i practiced things like apparent high speed stalls, where the indication is that you have speed enough but are still stalling, and so you dont trust the indicated airspeed. If you know your altitude and suspect a stall, you dont pull immediately for fear of triggering another stall. You biuld up some airspeed first. If you have it, you use the altitude.
technofiend 8y ago
>Any pilot would react and correct in a second at most. I can only speak to my personal experience and I don't have any sort of advanced pilot's license: I just did the very first one - PP/ASEL. In that course even prior to instrument training I was taught to not fly by the seat of my pants. The way my flight instructor explained it the human body is easily fooled and will quickly adapt to a new normal. So you had as an example a pilot getting used to a slight tilt and assuming this is normal, so they keep correcting for the tilt and worsening their situtation. Even as a lowly PP/ASEL I'd still validate any reaction by reading the instruments before assuming a feeling of falling is accurate. Would that take thirteen seconds? Hopefully not, but it would take more than one. Combined with the idea that airline pilots do less and less hand flying and also have many inputs in the cockpit trying to tell them what's happening and therefore may need a few seconds to integrate all that data and then react with a potentially rusty skill I'd feel comfortable saying a subsecond response seems unlikely.