Poor Pilot Training Blamed For Virgin Galactic Crash

astroengine writes: SpaceShipTwo co-pilot Michael Alsbury was not properly trained to realize the consequences of unlocking the vehicle's hinged tail section too soon, a mistake that led to his death and the destruction of the ship during a test flight in California last year. Responsibility for the accident falls to SpaceShipTwo manufacturer Scaled Composites, a Mojave, Calif., company owned by Northrop Grumman Corp, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) determined at a webcast hearing on Tuesday (PDF). Poor oversight by the Federal Aviation Administration, which oversees commercial spaceflights in the United States, was also a factor in the accident, the NTSB said.

Comments

Maybe he thought that "Unlock" would only unlock

[perlwannabe]

From the report:
The unlocking of the feather during the transonic region resulted in uncommanded feather operation because the external aerodynamic loads on the feather flap
assembly were greater than the capability of the feather actuators to hold the assembly in the unfeathered position with the locks disengaged.

So maybe the copilot thought that he was preparing for the future feathering operation by unlocking it, and he did not think he was initiating the feathering. Usually an "unlock" switch is only a permissive, and it does not initiate the actual operation.