Originally Posted by
Raynz
Cheers, I didn't realise the airbus throttles didn't move in Auto throttle. Although thinking back I was surprised the Boeing ones did when in the 737 FBS (through flight experience).
Would you say that the pilots should have known how a faulty radio alt would have affected the autopilot, or is it too much to know how each instrument affects the automation?
In AF447 (an A330 but common Airbus issue), among the issues noted in the final report was that autothrottle does not move the actual levers. So it looked to the crew in all the confusion that power was set for cruise. In fact, it changed several times as some of the automated systems kept working. Same thing happened with full nose-up trim (also not visible on the manual control). And the Airbus control sticks don't move in physical unison, so pilot flying can be commanding changes and pilot not flying may not notice it on his side of the cockpit.
Boeing made different design decisions on similarly automated 777 and 787.
It was dark and bumpy and everything went south suddenly after the computers said, in effect, "your airplane." There is an excellent, fair-minded column on this very subject in the current Flying magazine by Peter Garrison. No link, as it's not posted yet.