Terrifying. Why couldnt they pull out? Im not a pilot obviously.
Another user posted a summary of events that goes into more detail, but if I remember right from another thread the pilots had ~3 opportunities to break out of the dive but failed to do the right things at the right moments. Certainly panic had a part to play.
From Wikipedia:
Shortly after midnight on 23 March 1994, the aircraft was en route from Sheremetyevo International Airport in Moscow to Kai Tak Airport in Hong Kong, with 75 occupants aboard, of whom 63 were passengers.[4][7][8] Relief pilot Kudrinsky was taking his two children on their first international flight, and they were brought to the cockpit while he was on duty.[9] Five people were thus on the flight deck: Kudrinsky, co-pilot Piskaryov, Kudrinsky’s son Eldar (age 15) and daughter Yana (age 13),[10] and another pilot, Vladimir Makarov, who was flying as a passenger.[11][page needed]
With the autopilot active, Kudrinsky, against regulations, let the children sit at the controls.[9][12][13] Yana took the pilot’s left front seat at 00:43. Kudrinsky adjusted the autopilot heading to give her the impression that she was turning the plane, though she actually had no control of the aircraft. Shortly thereafter, at 00:51, Eldar occupied the pilot’s seat.[9] Unlike his sister, Eldar applied enough force to the control column to contradict the autopilot for 30 seconds.
Just under four minutes after Eldar occupied pilot’s seat, this caused the flight computer to switch the plane’s ailerons to manual control, while maintaining control over the other flight systems. Eldar was now in partial control of the aircraft.[14][15] A silent indicator light came on to alert the pilots to this partial disengagement. The pilots, who had previously flown Soviet-designed planes that had audible warning signals, apparently failed to notice it.[16]
Eldar was the first to notice a problem, when he observed that the plane was banking right. Shortly after, the flight path indicator changed to show the new flight path of the aircraft as it turned. Since the turn was continuous, the resulting predicted flight path drawn on screen was a 180° turn. This indication is similar to those shown when in a holding pattern, where a 180° turn is required to remain in a stable position. This confused the pilots for nine seconds, during which time the plane banked past a 45° angle to almost 90°, steeper than the design allowed. The A310 cannot turn this steeply while maintaining altitude, and the plane started to descend quickly. The increased g-forces on the pilots and crew made regaining control extremely difficult for them. The autopilot, which no longer controlled the ailerons, used its other controls to compensate, pitching the nose up and increasing thrust. As a result, the plane began to stall; the autopilot, unable to cope, disengaged completely. A second, larger indicator light came on to alert the pilots of the complete disengagement, and this time they did notice it. At the same time, the autopilot’s display screen went blank. To recover from the stall, an automatic system lowered the nose and put the plane into a nosedive.[6] The reduced g-forces enabled Kudrinsky to retake his seat. Piskaryov then managed to pull out of the dive, but over-corrected, putting the plane in an almost vertical ascent, again stalling the plane, causing the plane to enter a spin. During the spin, Kudrinsky managed to almost recover the plane, but he pulled back too aggressively, causing their speed to drop, and then a rudder input sent the plane into a second spin, only this time they entered a flat spin. Although Kudrinsky and Piskaryov managed to regain control again and leveled out the wings, they did not know how far they had descended during the crisis and their altitude by then was too low to recover. The plane crashed at 00:58 in a flat attitude at high vertical speed, estimated at 70 m/s (140 kn; 160 mph; 250 km/h).[17] All 75 occupants died on impact.[7][18]
The aircraft crashed with its landing gear up, and all passengers had been prepared for an emergency, as they were strapped into their seats.[17] No distress calls were made before the crash.[3] Despite the struggles of both pilots to save the aircraft, it was later concluded that if they had simply let go of the control column after the first spin, aerodynamic principles would have caused the plane to return to level flight, thus preventing the crash.[18] There was no evidence of a technical failure in the plane.[11][19]
deleted by creator
Right? It happened so fast.
This one hit me hard because I imagined being on the plane or putting myself in the position of the pilots who made an egregious error. One moment you’re showing kids the controls and the next it’s life-and-death. Lots of people needlessly died that day. Live for them.
