Originally Posted by
ARealTimTuffy
The text exchange is still very bad. I never felt it’s significance was directly about MCAS anyway. Although it would have been nice if after seeing it activate inappropriately in the sim and the control difficulties it caused, someone dig deeper to see if there had been any testing on if it were to activate at an inappropriate time. Regardless of the reason.
But, I have felt it’s significance is that it shows the pressure that the development group was under. A candid conversation about what a gong show was going on. It shows that he was unaware of the low speed activation of MCAS and had previously not described that to the FAA, but they didn’t go back and try to correct the information provided they just let it slide.
Then the emails about “jedi mind tricking”, clearly describes what he knew he was doing was wrong. In regards to describing the training requirements to foreign regulators.
conclusion = still very bad. And as a Max pilot, infuriating.
It would be interesting to find out what Forkner told the Brazilian Certifying Authority, ANAC, about MCAS and how that was implemented as a category "B" training item for GOL's Max pilots. MCAS is listed in their OER which was completed about 2 years after Forkner's sim episode. Forkner is listed as a participating team member:
http://www.anac.gov.br/assuntos/seto...evoriginal.pdf