Posts by user "hanche" [Posts: 5 Total up-votes: 0 Pages: 1]

That picture of the mostly intact tail section should indicate that the FDR and CVR should be eminently recoverable, most likely not even damaged, right?

I'd be surprised. For sure, the accident scene belongs to first responders for now. Recovery of bodies and the search for survivors take priority.

Regarding the sound believed to be the RAT: Some people suggest that the sound might come from the street, not the plane. I'd say the apparent doppler effect heard would indicate otherwise. It would be interesting to do a spectral analysis to check if the frequency drop is indeed compatible with the expected doppler effect. I wouldn't be surprised if several readers have the software and know-how to perform a simple analysis.

One thing to keep in mind in the midst of the discussion of brain farts and the notion that no experienced captain would ever do that : A medical issue impairing brain function can strike out of the blue, even in an individual who is perfectly healthy, both mentally and physically. A mini stroke is just one of many possibilities. So it is quite conceivable that the captain did indeed move the cutoff switches, and then denied it, and yet nobody is to blame , not even the captain himself, because there is no way the problem could have been detected before it arose. Highly unlikely? Yes, but then this whole accident was highly unlikely to begin with.
(Not a pilot, nor a medical expert. I am getting back on dry land before the sharks appear.)

There is conditional probability, typically written P(A|B): The probability of event A given that event B happened. As a function of A for a fixed B, it satisfies all the axioms for probability, such as P(A1 or A2|B)=P(A1|B)+P(A2|B) provided A1 and A2 are mutually exclusive. Hence it makes some sense to say "probability" when you should strictly speaking say conditional probability. Note that P(B|B)=1, i.e., the conditional probability of rolling a six given that you rolled a six is one. Shorter, somewhat misleading formulation: If you rolled a six, the "probability" of rolling a six is one. It's the sort of shorthand often used.

Edited to add: The definition is P(A|B)=P(A and B)/P(B).
When B is an outcome, such as this awful tragedy, and A a possible cause, one often speak of P(A|B) as the a posteriori (or posterior) probability, whereas P(A) is called the a priori (or prior) probability. Here endeth the lesson, lest we venture into the land of Bayesian statistics.