Are you serious??? This is the second time that you have said this about the AA crash. Sure the Captain is responsible for the safety of the flight, but at what point after the tail fell off was he supposed to do something about it???

This is straight from NTSB.gov:

"The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the in-flight separation of the vertical stabilizer as a result of the loads beyond ultimate design that were created by the first officer’s unnecessary and excessive rudder pedal inputs."


It is not the Captain's fault that the guy sitting next to him, who was at the controls, decided to overstress the airframe before a reaction could be made.