Boeing 737 Max Discussion

[AudubonB]

As the 737 Max situation never should deserve its own thread on TMC, yet has been brought up here a number of times, I'll use this thread to chime in.

My mole in the FAA had, inter alia, the following to say. Of note: (1) his bailiwick does not include oversight of Boeing. (2) He is far more often critical of his employer than he is defensive of it.

1. Boeing did this portion of the build on-the-cheap

2. His opinion of FAA's decision not to ground is that that is the correct one. BTW: as we were talking, Trump's trumping of FAA came across the wires.

3. The scenario as being played out right now is an interesting convergence - or divergence - of engineering vs political. For him, the engineering aspects correctly point to keeping the planes flying. The political ones....well, you know the answer to that.

4. There is absolutely zero evidence of a software worm, etc., nefariously lurking as a mole. Wrong on all counts.

5. Zero action should be taken until the black boxes are examined - and this should be done immediately. For me, this is where the story begins to be interesting:

• Boeing and NTSB want the boxes to be brought right away to D.C., as there is where the most qualified to assess are located
• Ethiopia (he wasn't certain of the Indonesian situation) is of absolutely zero mind to do so. Rather, it wants to send its box to a UK-based lab.
• It is crucial not only to look at each box - of course - but to ascertain whether there is or is not an identical factor in the two accidents.

6. His engineering-based summary is that no further action should be taken until the black box information is assessed; it would not take long to do so; he did, however, understand the political-based decisions not only of the rest of the world but also, as we were talking, Mr Trump's action.​

 

[bxr140]

Zero action should be taken until the black boxes are examined

Ignoring the inevitable narcissism from POTUS on the grounding...

As a left brain aerospace nerd that attempts to look up over my monitor from time to time, grounding is the right choice. There's more than just an engineering response to most situations, and in this case overall perception/confusion/concern can be better contained by a simple grounding. Despite many engineers being automatons, most people are people...as it turns out.

If the black box examination really is that easy, the grounding will be lifted soon. Conversely, if the MAX fleet flies and then the examination results in a grounding down the road, that's going to do a lot of long term damage to confidence in the FAA and Boeing. Strategically, "Trust me baby, I'll never do it again" is at best a break even...

I also think the UK is the right location for an examination, as long as there's complete oversight from Boeing and the FAA. Unless someone's afraid of what they'll find, that impartiality is going to pay dividends.

 

[AudubonB]

I can't edit my post #35; in point #5b, I should have written "France", not UK. No big deal; as others may have heard, that is indeed where at least the Ethiopian box now is headed. I've not heard about the Indonesian one.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Boeing is a fantastic company. They have elaborate systems to evaluate failures and proceedures to correct them.

Once they determine the fault they will do what ever is necessary to resolve the issue.

Most every company has failures. The fact that for airplanes the failures can result in the tremendous loss of human life.

Trump has a good idea that modern planes are way too complex, and lives are at risk. Perhaps simpler designs might be the way of the future.

Modern airplanes are awesome. They are quieter and more efficient than they have ever been.
They've helped lower the cost of flying, and the latest planes have such long ranges that they're expanding direct long-haul flights, while being quieter helps passenger comfort (lost if airlines pack more passengers in).

The addition of modern infotainment also helps make the flight less boring. (For those of us unable to sleep on airplanes.)

Aviation's problem right now isn't the airplanes, it's training enough pilots to fly them.

 

[Uncle Paul]

No need to train pilots anymore. They can just purchase FSF (Full Self Flying) upgrades. Only $2,000 from Tesla until Monday : >)

 

[AudubonB]

Err...SpaceX or "Cars & Transportation" Mod: I think there were some reply posts that also should be ported over..... It's kinda lonely here in this new thread...

 

[Grendal]

Makes a lot of sense to me. What pushes this has more to do with timing than anything else. There have been hundreds, if not thousands, of flights of these planes since 2017. Two accidents in very recent times has created a news sensation similar to the Tesla fires. JMHO.

 

[Grendal]

Err...SpaceX or "Cars & Transportation" Mod: I think there were some reply posts that also should be ported over..... It's kinda lonely here in this new thread...

Sorry about that. Now I'm stuck because I don't have permission to merge those other posts into this thread. I'll go to the moderators forum and request it.

 

[Kuhz]

So you’re saying shorting BA is a bad idea......

 

[Brando]

2 newly made/designed 737 planes crash, killing near 500 people. More people than most have on their email contacts.
IF they had grounded after the first crash, 350 men women children would still be alive.
Some people at Boeing should probably spend a few days in jail to wake them up. We just don't know who.

Using Trump (as the usual distraction) - Boeing PR dept. considering themselves brilliant for that idea.
keeping the planes flying?? The black boxes weren't examined in the first 24 hours?? color me speechless

 

[bxr140]

2 newly made/designed 737 planes crash, killing near 500 people. More people than most have on their email contacts.
IF they had grounded after the first crash, 350 men women children would still be alive.

This is already a terrible scenario; Trumping facts only hurts credibility and whatever point that's being made.

For reference:
Lion Air = ~189 crew+pax
Ethiopian Airlines = ~157 crew+pax

 

[Brando]

This is already a terrible scenario; Trumping facts only hurts credibility and whatever point that's being made.

For reference:
Lion Air = ~189 crew+pax
Ethiopian Airlines = ~157 crew+pax

thanks for the correction.

Since I don't even know 300 people on a first name basis - it is almost beyond my imagination.
I still think Boeing nearly criminal for not grounding on the first accident while they figured out what went wrong.

How strange the world has become.

Let us prosecute Elon Musk for ...

 

[Cosmacelf]

At this point, it looks like the plane can think it is in a stall when it isn’t, and direct the plane’s nose down, all while close to the ground. Pilot instruction to turn off this obviously malfunctioning “safety” system is lacking in non US countries. And Btw, the reason for this extra safety system in this new plane is that they moved the engines forward in this design, and thus the plane has a tighter stall point tolerance. Boeing sold this plane as needing minimal retraining even though the flying characteristics (not to mention automated systems) are different. It appears they bandaided the need for new flight instruction with malfunctioning and poorly designed “safety” software.

So, yeah, grounding was absolutely the right choice and Boeing should take a hit for this.

 

[S'toon]

In the over 1,600-page flight manual of Boeing's 737 Max 8 planes, the aircraft's new MCAS computer system, now at the centre of the investigations into two deadly crashes, is mentioned only once by name — in the glossary of abbreviated terms.

That brief mention in the manual, a copy of which was obtained by CBC News, has prompted some speculation that more details about the anti-stall computer system may have been included in previous drafts, but then left out of the final version.

"I think the fairly obvious conclusion is that a broader explanation of MCAS was included in an earlier edition of the manual, and somewhere along the way it ended up on the cutting room floor," said Judson Rollins, a New Zealand-based aviation consultant, who worked for three airlines and a plane manufacturer.

Rollins believes it was cut "to prevent the MCAS from having to be included in 737 Max transition training, which in turn will save 737 Max operators training costs."

But Rollins said that including MCAS in the manual would suggest it was a significant enough system that pilots would need to undergo classroom- or simulator-based training.

Costs for that extended training, he said, could range anywhere from hundreds of thousands of dollars per plane to the low millions.

The operating manual mentions the term MCAS under the section entitled "Abbreviations," where the acronym is defined as "Maneuver Characteristics Augmentation System." That's the one and only reference to MCAS, which is suspected of playing a role in two recent crashes involving Max 8 planes in Indonesia and Ethiopia, which killed 346 people in total.


<snip>

Full article at:
737 Max flight manual may have left MCAS information on 'cutting room floor' | CBC News

 

[Cosmacelf]

That’s even worse than I thought it was. A brand new automated system that has the capacity to crash the airplane isn’t even documented in a 1600 page manual? The suspicion is indeed that they did this for cost/marketing reasons.

I can surmise how this happened. Marketing said we need a more fuel efficient 737 variant that costs the same as the old one. Engineering saves fuel cost by moving the engines and makes other changes that change flight characteristics requiring retraining. Marketing complains saying that isn’t good enough, retraining is too expensive, so engineering applies bandaids (MCAS) to paper over the retraining that would be required. But now you have to train MCAS, and that disappeared too, again, to save costs to airlines.

Obviously Boeing Engineering is not what it used to be. First, they don’t appear to have any clout in the company. And second, their bandaid was badly, fatally, flawed.

This whole episode is also showing incompetent executive management. They appear to have ignored the whole thing after the first crash. Wasn’t executive management interested in knowing if a second crash of this brand new airplane could happen due to the same flaw?

 

[nwdiver]

I'm not a pilot but I find aviation culture fascinating especially the overlap of human performance and automation with the nuclear industry. Mentor Pilot did a good overview of MCAS. I read recently in the NY times that pilots tested a MCAS failure in a simulator and only had 40s to save the plane.

 

[Brando]

OPEN LETTER TO BOEING – Passengers First, Ground the 737 MAX 8 Now! | Ralph Nader

https://www.washingtonpost.com/loca...ory.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.d599a08076d5

 

[Brando]

Aerospace reporter Dominic Gates talks about the ‘huge issues’ in the Boeing 737 MAX’s flawed design

Militarism is destroying our country. Boeing too. Military pays more for less. IMHO

US media too busy talking about Russia gate myth. Sad state of failures.
And US government wants Assange in jail.

 

[bxr140]

Dude, did you go to the Trump school of sentence structure?

 

[nwdiver]

Dude, did you go to the Trump school of sentence structure?

He uses all the best words. That I can tell you.