For the record, the loss of life was tragic aboard AA 587.

Back to the thread, some of us have seen the American Airlines training video that was mentioned, whereas rudder manipulation is suggested by the instructor to recover from unusal attitudes including high angles of attack. I do not agree with this theory.

The acrobatic video insidiously leads a pilot down a path they shouldn't be lead down. For this reason, the video should not have been used as part of American Airline's training program for new hires.

From watching it, I was lead to believe "use rudder for recovery when the plane is not flying rightside-up" as your last resort. However, nowhere in the video was the advocation of full-scale rudder deflections (doublets) to recover.

When AA 587 entered the wake turbulence, it was not in an unusual attitude. Second the reaction by the flying pilot was not appropriate to the situation. Specifically, the rudder doublets, (to me) were a sign of panic and inexperience not recovery from an unusual attitude. Even if the Airbus was in an unusual attitude, full scale rudder deflections from side to side would only serve to induce yaw occillation(s), not recovery of any sort.

But remember, as initial new hires at AA it is ingrained in their mind...use rudder for recovery. The path was set and the student applied the lesson incorrectly. Therein lies the insidious nature of the acrobatic video. I think the video put into the mind of the F/O, use rudder to recover, but unfortunately it wasn't clear to him as to why. To me, transport-category airliners are designed to be stable. Words like positive dihederal and positive dynamic stability are words thrown around to describe that an airliner really wants to fly straight and true if you let it especially after being upset by wake turbulence.

To come full circle, why release a acrobatic video with insidiously negative procedures when they might be misunderstood by a new hire and unfortunatly create a path to further agravate a flight scenario which could have been resolved by letting the plane do what it was designed to do...dampen the oscillations and return to straight and level flight ?

There was another mention of a American Airline company message regarding recent high altitude stalls (with passengers aboard) on the MD, er, sorry, the Super 80 fleet. Here is an excerpt from the message:

NOTHING COMPENSATES FOR WATCHING YOURAIRSPEED INDICATOR

This is good advice, but does it really fully address the problem ? No.

The message does state that American Airlines is re-calculating their performance charts for the Super 80, but more importantly are they re-training their pilots ? IMHO, stalling an airliner full of passengers on two separate instances during this past July is inexcusable.

Again, what did we learn from this ? The MD80 is not a high altitude airplane like the Boeings, it has no wing. Doesn't matter how fast you're going, if you're too heavy you shouldn't be up there.


American has provided the guidance of watch your airspeed at cruise, but once again this guidance falls short and possibly creates "the insidious path" of-at high altitude, go fast and you won't have any problem.


Airliners aren't meant to be flown acrobatically....

FF