kgwilson

The transition from one state to another is reported via programs to the FDR (software). The reported transition is electro mechanical if induced by the pilot. It could also be induced by a short circuit in the wiring or switch itself. While highly unlikely it is still possible.

I agree. It is a superb aircraft. I flew in one from Sydney to Auckland some years ago. I am sure they are investigating the backgrounds of the pilots extremely thoroughly.

I don't think it is obvious at all that the cutoff switches were moved in the cockpit. That may just have been an assumption by the pilot when power was lost and the other pilot said he didn't. This assumes the 2nd pilot was not planning a crash. The reports states at about 08:08:42 UTC and immediately thereafter, the Engine 1 and Engine 2 fuel cutoff switches transitioned from RUN to CUTOFF position one after another with a time gap of 01 sec. The Engine N1 and N2 began to decrease from their take-off values as the fuel supply to the engines was cut off. In the cockpit voice recording, one of the pilots is heard asking the other why did he cutoff. The other pilot responded that he did not do so. There are likely to be plenty of conspiracy theories going around but a software or system logic failure cannot be ruled out. If it was a system failure then over 1100 787s would be immediately grounded and that could put another nail in the Boeing & US Aviation industries coffin.

So if neither pilot actually moved the switches how did the fuel then get cut off?

I still reckon the system shut the fuel off as it got an instruction from some other part of the system that the valves were to be closed, so that's what it did.

Not very likely does not mean impossible. I spent 30 years in the computer industry & programs thought to be fail safe did things that they were never programmed to do. With multiple systems checking each other with fail over processes and fail safe logic there should be no way that things like this could happen.Very highly unlikely but not impossible.

The physical action of moving a switch from on to off where computers control everything just means an electronic instruction has been passed to the computer controlling the fuel supply to tell the system to shut off the fuel. The physical process is purposely made difficult to prevent accidental activation. If somewhere in the system amongst the billions of transistors present on thousands of chipsets a software malfunction somehow erroneously thought it was instructed to shut off the fuel to the engines nothing could have been done to prevent it.

CATL announced the 500Wh/kg a year ago and have been testing the technology since. With the market announcement in April I'd think that those who already have electric aircraft operating or in the pipeline will gain significant performance and range. What it can do straight away is improve the range of the existing Pipistrel quite dramatically as its existing batteries provide about 150kWh/kg. Charging time is falling massively too. Both BYD & CATL have developed Megawatt chargers that can provide 1000km of range in 5 minutes for an EV with a 100kWh battery. These are of course not main stream yet but the technology is here so it will not be far away. There is a lot of investment going in to battery powered short haul and vtol aircraft & autonomous operation. There was a demo one at last years Oshkosh.

10 out of 15 Boeing Engineers said in an interview they wouldn't fly on a Dreamliner. There are plenty of youtube videos citing Boeings problems and especially the problems with the 787. https://en.as.com/videos/video-of-boeing-engineers-goes-viral-i-wouldnt-fly-on-one-of-these-planes-v/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxV0CqGlgwQ&t=12s

I always understood that the CVR & FDR were located in the tail section of the aircraft as this is the least likely place to suffer severe damage in a crash. The tail section got torn off & stuck in the first building so unless the units are further forward in a 787, you'd think that they should be in reasonable condition & not fire damaged.

Report from ABC website. No other details & it would seem no one knew about it till the wreckage was discovered by Police who were looking for a stolen car NSW farmer who died in aircraft crash remembered as community man - ABC News WWW.ABC.NET.AU Father of three Paul Adam died when his recreational aircraft crashed in Central West NSW.

There will be a fair bit of scrutiny on Boeing as well. During the 737 Max & the door blow out fiasco a number of Boeing Engineers working or had worked on the 787 project were scathing of Boeings build and safety processes, some saying they would never fly on a dreamliner

I agree with Brendan. I reckon the piston is not returning after braking. Pull the whole wheel cylinder apart & check for rub marks grit etc, clean everything meticulously, reassemble & make sure moving parts i.e. the piston moves freely.

Make sure you reset the spark plug gap to the minimum (about .020 in) for the cold weather. That and make sure the throttle is fully closed & the choke fully on. My gen 3 3300 always started even when it was pretty cold with a light frost with the plug gap about 023 but when I went out west and there was ice on the fuselage I could not get it to start & flattened the battery. I took all the plugs out, closed the gap up & at the time not with any feeler gauge, just a good eye, got a jump start & it fired almost straight away.. Never had a problem since as I change the gap when it gets cold every year. If all that fails get a cold start kit from Jabiru. It is basically a gruntier coil. It replaces one of the standard coils & provides a much bigger spark on one of the plugs in each cylinder.

Given both are in the tail and it was left intact sticking out of a building extraction of the data should not present a problem. Then again stranger things have happened before.