Patent ID: 8838295

Claim:
An energy protection method performed by an energy protection device on board an aircraft that also includes at least one engine and an autothrottle, the method comprising: (a) monitoring, automatically and repeatedly with a plurality of sensors included in the energy protection device, a plurality of data of the aircraft during a flight of the aircraft, so as to detect a triggering situation caused by a low energy situation, in which a predetermined operational flight domain has ended and an energy protection function should be activated to avoid the low energy situation defined by at least one of low speed, high incidence, and low engine thrust; and (b) activating the protection function, with a control unit connected to the sensors when the triggering situation is detected by the sensors, the activating including automatically engaging the autothrottle into an active engagement state if the autothrottle is not already engaged and automatically controlling the at least one engine so that the at least one engine supplies a maximum thrust and maintains the maximum thrust during the protection function; (c1) recording an original engagement state of the autothrottle, automatically with the control unit included in the energy protection device when the triggering situation is detected, the original engagement state being defined at the time of the triggering situation and before the activating at step (b); (c2) implementing a monitoring when the triggering situation is detected, to automatically and repeatedly monitor parameters of the aircraft, so as to detect a return back to the predetermined operational flight domain; and (d) automatically deactivating the protection function, with the control unit included in the energy protection device, and setting the autothrottle with the control unit into a new engagement state based on the original engagement state recorded in the control unit, when a return back to the predetermined operational flight domain is detected in step (c2), thereby avoiding a continued maintaining of supplying maximum thrust at the at least one engine.