US & CDN NTSB: Airbus A320 has rudder flaw
 

Thanks FAT! This problem is address in the FCOM bulletins "Blue pages" Vol number 3. It was issue after the AA crash mentioned in the link.

Cheers

See DAL guys! I told you the 320 was scary! :eek:

Stay far, far away!!!! :p

I'm sure the French will claim their airplane is perfect and that its the pilots who have the flaw. :rolleyes:

This article surprises me. I understand that airplanes aren't certified to push the rudder full deflection back and forth. However, even then, we've not seen the loss of other types of airplanes because of this (Boeing, McD, etc.). I'm not bringing the hate on Airbus. It is obvious they make good jets, but also, there seems to be something wrong here.

I don't like this statement, and it could very well be the media's words and not the NTSB, "The NTSB concluded that a design flaw in the Airbus A300-600 rudder was part of the reason that an American Airlines pilot made several abrupt movements of the rudder". This begs the question, what is the design flaw?

Yesterday I was in EWR and we parked next to AF A330. I couldn't help but think about their accident recently. I remembered that picture of the divers in the water with the airplanes tailfin almost completely intact. Then I log in and see this article and I just had to post.

A300 Rudder Flaw
 

Easy on the rudder folks ...

NTSB: A320 Has Rudder Flaw — Civil Aviation Forum | Airliners.net

If you fly the airplane with in the limits and follow the proper procedures, the airplane is completely safe. Plus it is easier and safer to fly than many others.

Remember, no airplane is pilot proof. If it were we would not be needed and 12yr old XBOX kids would be flying the aircraft. There are always a way that a pilot can bend/break/destroy/crash an airplane. You can design a plane to be pilot proof, but it would be so expensive and heavy that you could never carry enough pax to make it profitable.

If they make every airliner be designed and built to meet aerobatic stresses at full gross weight (+6/-3) and land like an F-18 then maybe something like this could not happen. But it is unrealistic to even to try, let alone even think of it.

It is just a bunch of paper pushers trying to justify thier jobs (have to find something to do or someone to blame)

Just my opinion......

FNG

Sickening. I can't believe how quickly it occured. I had to see it twice to even catch the problem. I does appear that the rudder was taken through two full deflection cycles, not just one.

I'm not really in agreement with you. For those who think that this is old news, the following safety recommendations (there's two) from the NTSB are dated 4Aug2010.

http://www.ntsb.gov/recs/letters/2010/A-10-119-120.pdf

They are in response to the Air Canada flight that encountered a high altitude wake turbulence upset. The CA used the rudder. But from what i can tell, the rudder is overly sensitive at high speeds. The aircraft experienced only -.49G and .49G forces in the lateral plane. That exceeded the aircraft ultimate design limit load by 29% !!!

Therefore, the NTSB is recommending that the European Aviation Safety Agency modify aircraft certification rules in the lateral plane, to include sensitivity to speed, as well as a rudder speed limiter for existing aircraft -- all because pilots are human and make mistakes.

There's still a problem whether you don't believe so.