Air France pilots battled for 15 minutes to save doomed flight AF 447

Telegraph ^

[justlurking]

Does the 330 have ‘stick shaker’, or, joystick shaker, I guess? If so, does the autopilot automatically disengage when it activates?

I don't know for sure, but the non-authoritative information I've found says that the 330 with the side-stick controller does NOT have a stick shaker.

The fly-by-wire system does have a de-facto stick "pusher" -- or more accurately, the flight control system will avoid or recover the plane from a stall as long as it is still working and you aren't close enough to the ground that it thinks you are landing.

I don't know what the autopilot does under those circumstances, once it recovers from the stall.

[ArmstedFragg]

I located a chart of exactly what’s enabled and what isn’t for each operational state somewhere online. I’m trying to remember the search now...

Oh, here it is:

http://www.airbusdriver.net/airbus_fltlaws.htm

There’s reference to the pseudo-pusher there, too.

The details are so cobbled up at the moment, I’m at a loss to explain why there are so many “informed judgments” about what took place. Just today, I’ve heard the piece of data about speed described as being both over speed and under speed. And, of course, we now have word that the debris found wasn’t from the aircraft. I don’t think we’ll really know anything until the FDR is recovered.

[Hulka]

Please re-read Post 120.

Absent totality of facts, we cannot know for 100% certainty what happened. We can discuss probable causes and most likely causes, but at this stage of the mishap investigation it is premature to allege as fact a specific cause. We have good information regarding a probable sequence of events defining the inflight breakup, but we have no certainty of the initiating cause/event of the breakup. The preponderance of subjective interpretation favors inflight breakup due to extreme weather conditions, but we don't know if this is the cause.

I can only believe that given your swift certain judgment you are not a) trained in aviation mishap investigation, and b) never participated in aviation mishaps investigations.

That's okay, everyone has an opinion and you have yours.

[Lazamataz]

I’m sorry, Dave. I can’t fly that.

[NittanyLion]

According to a poster on PPRuNe.net ,"The Air Comet flight was 7° north and 49° west while the AF 447 was something like 30° west [mine - and on the Equator]."

Source

[AirPlain]

The HF radio used by transport aircraft is SSB (single side band) and is very effective over long distances. It doesn’t matter about the local interference from the storm because where the signal will be received it is probably electrically “quiet” and not influenced by the interference at the origin end. Most likely, the data was transmitted over a satellite data link which would support high speed and be very reliable.
The events, as outlined, show a very troubled aircraft coming apart in flight for whatever reason. A tragedy by any measure.