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I found this part about unreliable airspeed indicators interesting: "Thus flight envelope protections based on airspeed data from unreliable ADRs may activate.

I found this part about unreliable airspeed indicators interesting: "Thus flight envelope protections based on airspeed data from unreliable ADRs may activate. This may lead to pitch inputs from the flight computers that cannot be overridden with the sidesticks. In this case, immediately switch off any two ADRs" Aside from actually having plenty of redundancy to avoid this scenario (this can only happen if two out of three sensors fail), this is basically the Airbus equivalent of MCAS. I wonder how well documented (and trained) this scenario is (and suspect that pilots are a lot more aware of it).

kayfox 7y ago
Heres what happens when that happens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas_Flight_72 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas_Flight_72 Television special about that flight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cS1SMptlnQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cS1SMptlnQ
cesarb 7y ago
> this is basically the Airbus equivalent of MCAS I believe the Airbus flight envelope protection uses the same surfaces normally controlled by the sidesticks, ignoring the pilot inputs (which is possible because they're fly-by-wire), while Boeing's MCAS uses the pitch trim (since it cannot ignore the pilot inputs due to them being mechanically linked with cables). > I wonder how well documented (and trained) this scenario is (and suspect that pilots are a lot more aware of it). Here's a case of unreliable airspeed in which the three ADRs were turned off by the pilots: https://www.atsb.gov.au/publications/investigation_reports/2018/aair/ao-2018-053 https://www.atsb.gov.au/publications/investigation_reports/2... ("In accordance with published procedures, the flight crew turned off the three air data reference systems (ADRs)"), so it does seem to be documented/trained.
- selectodude 7y ago
  And the 777, which is FBW, has the same control protection as the Airbus jets. It's that the 737 is a completely obsolete design and duct-taping 2015 tech onto it was impossible.
briandear 7y ago
Air France 447 was another example. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/business/2014/10/air-france-flight-447-crash https://www.vanityfair.com/news/business/2014/10/air-france-...
vilhelm_s 7y ago
I thought the unreliable airspeed indicators section was particularly interesting because it can be read as a list of everything that the Air France Flight 447 crew did wrong...
redis_mlc 7y ago
> I wonder how well documented (and trained) this scenario is (and suspect that pilots are a lot more aware of it). One Airbus plane was lost because of that. I believe it was icing caused by maintenance staff cleaning the exterior and getting water on the various static ports, which then iced over. I think 5 people died.

kayfox 7y ago

Heres what happens when that happens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas_Flight_72 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas_Flight_72 Television special about that flight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cS1SMptlnQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cS1SMptlnQ

cesarb 7y ago

> this is basically the Airbus equivalent of MCAS I believe the Airbus flight envelope protection uses the same surfaces normally controlled by the sidesticks, ignoring the pilot inputs (which is possible because they're fly-by-wire), while Boeing's MCAS uses the pitch trim (since it cannot ignore the pilot inputs due to them being mechanically linked with cables). > I wonder how well documented (and trained) this scenario is (and suspect that pilots are a lot more aware of it). Here's a case of unreliable airspeed in which the three ADRs were turned off by the pilots: https://www.atsb.gov.au/publications/investigation_reports/2018/aair/ao-2018-053 https://www.atsb.gov.au/publications/investigation_reports/2... ("In accordance with published procedures, the flight crew turned off the three air data reference systems (ADRs)"), so it does seem to be documented/trained.

selectodude 7y ago
And the 777, which is FBW, has the same control protection as the Airbus jets. It's that the 737 is a completely obsolete design and duct-taping 2015 tech onto it was impossible.

briandear 7y ago

Air France 447 was another example. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/business/2014/10/air-france-flight-447-crash https://www.vanityfair.com/news/business/2014/10/air-france-...

vilhelm_s 7y ago

I thought the unreliable airspeed indicators section was particularly interesting because it can be read as a list of everything that the Air France Flight 447 crew did wrong...

redis_mlc 7y ago

> I wonder how well documented (and trained) this scenario is (and suspect that pilots are a lot more aware of it). One Airbus plane was lost because of that. I believe it was icing caused by maintenance staff cleaning the exterior and getting water on the various static ports, which then iced over. I think 5 people died.