MORE ON THE DREAMLINER CRASH

By Bob Walsh

 

 

One man survived the crash, he actually walked away with minor injuries.  Everybody else died along with several people on the ground.

I saw some "film" of the takeoff.  There were obvious problems.  The plane was over 500 feet off the ground but the landing gear had not been retracted.  The control surfaces looked funny.  Enhanced images and talking head techies indicate that the flaps and slats were not extended, at least not properly.  It is very hard for the plane to get enough lift without the slats and flaps.  Pretty much impossible actually.  Also the attitude of the aircraft was wrong.  The nose-up angle was indicative of an impending stall.

This is all sort of odd.  These newer aircraft have warning horns that SCREAM at you if you start your takeoff roll with the aircraft incorrectly configured.  Unless you turn the alarms off.  The flight deck crew had almost 10,000 hours between the two of them.  Most decent airlines I am told have a strict rule, you talk about NOTHING from the beginning of the pre-flight check list until  you hit 10,000 feet except the aircraft.  No idle chit-chat.  

Either the flight crew screwed the pooch big time or something went seriously wrong with the aircraft that was not detected by the crew or the computer until the situation became unrecoverable.  Right just now I am guessing option #1.  At least one of the flight data recorders has already been recovered.  There is also a surveillance camera on the flight deck actually WATCHING the instruments and how the crew is doing their thing.  I am confident they will figure out what happened.