That is true! I mentally calculated the feet per minute and compared it to some from crashes mentioned by him. About 1500 ft in 20s is 4500 ft/m so pretty steep but his reports I am sure have gone up to the 10000s.
I am interested in: did they stall? I guess FR had speed data so you could guess. Did they land at the destination or do an emergency landing somewhere?
There’s a chart of the speed - it’s around 250 knots so they’re going fast enough (source: personal MS flight simulator experience). The angle of attack is not shown, I think.
I am super curious about this: big dive, probably not a stall (?) but either aircraft was airworth to carry on to destination OR at least the crew thought it was. So all the controls and systems should be working properly, engines working. I am guessing they saw something worth avoiding? Birds? UFO (literally ... not aliens)? Another plane?
The linked article says they landed at destination.