I am not an expert, but shouldn’t it have been obvious to both of them that the rate of descent was too high, that it isn’t safe to land descending at 1,100 feet per minute? The snow and cross winds might make the landing more difficult, but they wouldn’t mostly cause the rate of descent, which is what broke the landing gear.
It isn’t fighting for controls, but the pilot can take control. He could also have taken control for the landing in difficult conditions before there were any problems.
The pilot was in control; that's the point. She was the PIC. If she couldn't make that landing, that's on her and the FAA.
He could also have taken control for the landing in difficult conditions...
Certainly, IF it was difficult conditions. This wasn't difficult conditions. The airport in Toronto has had the same weather conditions since it opened. Hundreds of thousands of similar landings have successfully taken place there without pancaking a commercial jet onto the runway so hard that it overturns and tears the wings tear off.
Same airport, same runway, same weather, same aircraft (non-experimental, no untested systems, no damaged or failed systems). What changed is the pilot and the Didn't Earn It (DEI) policy that put her there.
The airlines are pushing less competent pilots into the cockpit due to the pilot shortage that has been progressively worsening since the 1990s, and the FAA is complicit in the crime of aiding them.