Air France Crash

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/05/27/earlyshow/main20066744.shtml

There are a couple of disturbing things about this 2009 Air France crash.

The first is this -

There's one open area. And that's the location and the condition of the tail of that plane. That tail of that plane was found many, many, many miles away from the main debris field and it was found intact. The real question is -- did that tail come off before the plane hit the water? (Obviously it did) And when did it come off if it came off at all? That's what they're going to look at now."

Now when the plane first crashed in 2009 they found the tail floating, but nobody knew where the plane crashed. So nobody knew where the tail came off. Now they have the wreckage and they know the tail was far away. That means the tail came apart in flight. That is a big issue because it is the second time in 10 years an air bus composite tail broke off in flight.

It happened in Nov 2001 as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Flight_587

That was blamed on the pilot mishandling the controls. That is complete nonsense. The tail should NEVER come off a plane no matter what the pilot does. The tail needs to stay on. Period!

Twice it has come off. Both times on Airbus. Airbus uses composites on the tail and that is showing to be a weakness.

Boeing is building the Dreamliner mostly out of composites and it is a lemon from the start. That is going to be a disaster if these composites are the problem.

The second big issue is this pilot didn't know how to handle a stall. http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/27/uk-pilot-role-in-focus-in-air-france-cra-idUSLNE74Q04T20110527

That is the second time in 2 years a pilot encountered a stall and handled it incorrectly. It also happened in the Colgan Air Crash in Buffalo NY.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colgan_Air_Flight_3407

Repeat problems in plane crashes is never a good thing.