AirAsia- Indonesia Jet Lost in Java Sea

FDR previously retrieved; CVR now retrieved.

These black boxes will most likely show what happened and what the pilots perceived and thought was happening.

I'm voting for turbulence/icing affecting pitot tubes which caused a false overspeed warning and the inexperienced pilots were more afraid of the thunderstorm than anything else so they assumed they were in the thunderstorm and going way to fast for safety so they raised the nose to slow the airplane down and kept the nose raised which meant they were going very slow and eventually too slow to sustain lift. Pilots probably held the stall all the way down and hit the water tail first with very fast vertical speed and virtually no forward speed at all.

NOTE: Main fuselage located.

Ethnic Review: Not entirely off topic.

USA "Asian" equals Japanese, Chinese, Korean.
UK "Asian" equals Pakistani, Bangladeshian and "the Indian" (meaning curry vendor).
Australian "Asian" Indonesian, Javanese, Malayan, Thai, Timor, etc.

Java controllers are not really as slow as molasses but my understanding is they are considered slow.

Indonesian pilots often have military backgrounds which usually means fighter pilots. Hot shots.

Most of the FO's are in some sort of pay to fly situation, except for Air Asia. The FO pays for his hours of flight time and promotion to Captain.

Training? Air France has the lowest instructor ratio. Low Cost Cheapie Asian Airlines are pretty low too. Years ago Korean simulators always did their scenarios in a certain predetermined order so pilots really knew what was coming. Its the same thing in some other "asian" airlines. One airline formed a committee of five to improve English language skills in the airline. NONE of the five spoke English or could judge a candidate's competency in English.

Some things don't change. AF 447 lessons should have filtered down to Air Asia ... but it seems they didn't.

Quote: Fleastiff

Ethnic Review: Not entirely off topic.

USA "Asian" equals Japanese, Chinese, Korean.
UK "Asian" equals Pakistani, Bangladeshian and "the Indian" (meaning curry vendor).
Australian "Asian" Indonesian, Javanese, Malayan, Thai, Timor, etc.

Born in Asia.
Too me, Asian means Asian which includes India west to Japan east to Korea north to Indonesian south.
Its a big area, all are Asians in my eyes. I live in the USA, I consider all the above as Asians.
I constantly book clients USA to China on a US based carrier and India back to the USA on a US based carrier.
Clients worried fare will be real high, I advise even though flying into China and out of India, its still a roundtrip fare to Asia and back, not expensive one way fares. USA clients agree, both China and India are in Asia.
I never hear a questioning comment such as, "India is in Asia?"

Quote: terapined

Born in Asia.

Must be adventuresome to be born in a place where other people take their vacations.

The reason I posted this Ethnic Review of the term "Asian" is that the investigation will be by Indonesians but will involve actions and response times of a Javanese Air Traffic Controller, a French - Caribbean pilot, Asian passengers, Asian economic conditions, Asian corporate climates.

Our much-loved BBB has already posted some comments about the Air Traffic Controller but I fear those comments were based on a work ethic found in BBB and in other controllers in the United States. I think Air Crews more familiar with the area would burst into laughter expecting a quick response from a Javanese controller or expecting quick, corrective action from a Javanese controller. And as far as expecting quick disciplinary action from a supervisory controller, well in Mexico the word is Tomorrow but in Java the word is next week. I'm given to understand that airline pilots never tell Javanese controllers a joke on a Thursday, because it embarrasses them when laugh in church on Sunday morning.

Some segments of the industry train to minimums some segments train to mastery but at all times, its that weakest link that matters.

The Go-NO GO decision is not really available to a low cost carrier crew.

Its certainly not available if they've not received a weather briefing and looked at a weather map.

The WX radar is downward looking but has both automatic and manual scan modes and return delays are processed as water vapor.

No pilot wants his plane shaken apart by violent thunderstorms. No pilot really wants to ride severe air currents, but all pilots should be trained to realize that an accelerated high altitude stall is more likely and more dangerous than dealing with a sudden overspeed warning generated by iced up pitot tubes.

The training is always what button to push but there are sometimes situations wherein pilots have to actually know how to fly an airplane.

Quote: Fleastiff

Must be adventuresome to be born in a place where other people take their vacations.
.

Immigrated to USA as a baby, no memories of the homeland :-) Did go back to visit as a 6yr old and 22 yr old so I have those memories :-)
Do live in vacation land Florida where its crowded due to all the snow birds but they will all be gone in several months :-)

Cant wait to hear what in the black boxes. Hopefully we will get a pelimanary report soon.

Indonesians are not particularly known for openness or anything but final reports, but I too hope for preliminary transcripts and preliminary data readouts.