Originally Posted by sailingfun

Icing had nothing to do with the accident. They simply stalled the aircraft.


The airplane performance study and simulations showed that the airplane experienced minimal performance degradation because of ice accretion.184 Specifically, the AOA at the time of the wing stall was about 1° above the expected AOA for a clean wing (no ice accretion) stall warning. Thus, the airplane could have been operated in normal flight, at the non-icing Vref, and with a substantial margin remaining above the actual point of stall. As a result, the NTSB concludes that the minimal aircraft performance degradation resulting from ice accumulation did not affect the flight crew’s ability to fly and control the airplane. The flight crew’s actions during the accident sequence are further discussed in sections 2.2.2 through 2.2.4.


They were at 2300 feet on autopilot approaching the marker in level flight. The CA commanded gear down and flaps to 15. Props were set to fine pitch and power to idle. It was left there until the aircraft stalled. The PFD gave them 18 seconds of warning in red they were slowing below the commanded AS prior to stick shaker.