Looking at pictures on the BBC site, brings home the dilemma of storage. Since the loss of hundreds of aircraft would probably be fatal for Boeing, I'm wondering if they couldn't be flown to customers on a unique agreement that the hardware could be used for static training and engineering familiarity. By this I mean sending only to customers that have a serious intent to purchase - they have everything to gain by keeping the aircraft in good fettle. Those in the customer's livery first on the list.
Why take that risk? Well, storage is obvious, but having the product sample right there, encouraging the buyer is a plus. Trained up engineers learning while they're looking after the ever increasingly neglected hulls. Possibly the savings reflected in the final price. Let's face it, there's going to be some deals in the early stages. If these hulls were in the heat of San Antonio for example, they wouldn't be getting near the same attention.
It's getting to be a nothing-to-lose operation. The stored aircraft do not represent money in the bank. They could well be in better hands than scattered in the US.
So how to get them there. It seems incredible to me that with the software being modified by thousands of man-hour engineers, they can't easily present an off-switch instruction for the MCAS algorithm. I'd want that one button-press away anyway. There has to be a way of flying the darn thing without flaps.
I guess MCAS is so deeply embedded that it's hard to do, but given they've reportedly made radical changes, it's hard to imagine there's no OFF input.