Originally Posted by
Chris Close
If at or near VMO at that density altitude, with full down trim on the horizontal stab, what back pressure on the yoke is required to maintain level flight? Let alone climb? Is it even possible to maintain altitude under this configuration?
Why do we need to entertain a scenario that starts with an aircraft at an airspeed it should never have attained in the first place if the pilots were actually flying it? To answer your question though, once they turned the cut-out switches off, the aircraft was controllable, more so if it had been slowed to a normal, appropriate speed. Choosing (or simply allowing by inattention) the airspeed to increase beyond redline introduced aerodynamic forces that exceeded manual trim ability, introduced issues like Mach tuck and turned the situation into an unrecoverable event. That’s still on the pilots, not some random, uncontrollable outside forces. Fly the airplane.