Originally Posted by
DDCT
When most people talk about fly by wire, they are talking about the airplane taking the decision out of the pilots hand. Airbus does not allow a pilot to override the aircraft, even under a unique situation, even if plugged pitot tubes are giving the aircraft bad information. The reason for this is because the flight management system Airbus uses was designed by one of, if not the worst aviator in aviation history. Of course he wants to aircrafts computers to override a pilots decision, because he doesn't trust himself.
In addition, the design that Airbus uses is a problem, the Quantas 380 that lost an engine is proof, it took probably the most skilled Airbus 380 pilot on earth, along with three other pilots to manage the aircraft under a condition that should have been managed much easier. The bright side is that flying is so safe that even a perfect storm of failures still wasn't enough to bring a modern airliner down.
Sorry but your information is decades old....Airbus reversed their decision after a Paris Airshow incident back in the 80's when the pilot tried to override the aircrafts incorrect information only to have the plane crash with a bunch of VIP's....but like I said this change was made DECADES AGO...DL's Airbus's never ever had this version of the software as it had been changed before they received their first delivery....pilots CAN override the software on Airbus aircraft (matter of fact there's been several NTSB investigations into a33x pitot issues where even a few DL PIC's HAD to manually fly the plane during cruise, had these very skilled PIC's NOT manually taken control the plane certainly would have crashed due to the errors in information the software was receiving...was very well documented/reported in the past year or two in the US)
Last edited by socrates; Jan 25, 2011 at 4:08 am