This is a quote from one of my colleagues on BeechTalk:
I found the documentary one-sided in many respects. I'm not debating that the MCAS system was poorly designed, and that the pilots should have been informed and trained in the system. However the show relied heavily on common biased media/political tropes:
- Boeing tried to defend itself publicly - therefore they must be guilty
- Boeing has lobbyists on staff - therefore they must be guilty
- Boeing made decisions intended to improve profitability and reduce cost - anyone who does this is guilty
- Boeing did not release publicly the millions of pages of internal documents ordered by the government overnight - so they must be guilty
- Boeing pointed out that the crews did not follow the complete trim runaway procedures - clearly they were shifting blame and must be guilty
- The Boeing CEO did not call each family personally - so Boeing must be guilty. It would have been nice if the producers discussed that every call would have been recorded, posted to the internet, and used to suggest Boeing knew it was guilty.
- When Boeing officials met with the pilot's union they didn't provide documents, reports, and presentations - so they must have been hiding something (their guilt). Of course Boeing, in the middle of an investigation, probably felt anything they provided would be published out of context and used against them. I think this was a good supposition considering the pilot's union surreptitiously taped the meeting, edited the tape, and released it publicly to make Boeing look bad (and the pilots look good).
There were also a number of statements made which I have trouble with:
- 'Boeing concluded that if the pilots did not respond to an MCAS failure within 10 seconds, in every case the plane would be lost'. And repeated by the 'experts' on the show several times: 'it is physically impossible for a crew to respond in 10 seconds'. I seriously doubt that was the extent of the Boeing conclusion, and that it is physically impossible to intervene or respond within 10 seconds.
- 'Boeing knew that MCAS failures were likely, that they would doom the planes, and that they "conspired" to keep this information from pilots and operators'. Again I suspect this is a gross oversimplification or exaggeration.
I also thought the Airbus comparison was interesting. It was strongly implied that Airbus is a remarkable aircraft manufacturer, they build virtually perfect planes, much better than Boeing, and that because Boeing tried to compete by building an improved and very economic airframe/engine package Boeing is clearly a shoddy manufacturer with no concern for safety.
The show never adequately delved into two key factors which were Boeing's main defense: the normal procedure requiring disconnecting the speed trim system, and of reducing throttle to avoid an over-speed situation. The first was mentioned but little was said about why the first crew didn't disconnect the system (as they were trained). In the second crash, the crew did disconnect the system (this was demonstrated in the show), and it was shown that they were far above the safe airspeed which prevented manual trim from working, but the show did not question why the pilots didn't reduce the throttle while in a steep descent with excess airspeed. Of course the assumption is that with all the alarms going off the crews were distracted, still I think the show could have acknowledged that if the normal Boeing procedure had been followed the crashes would not have occurred. The show then could have then discussed in more detail the factors that would have made application of the proper procedures difficult or less likely (lack of training in MCAS failure modes, possible lack of training provided on speed-trim runaway, alarm overload, etc.
It's hard not to agree with the basic conclusion, but I get tired of "documentaries" that have a predetermined conclusion and without exception find that one player is totally guilty (evil in fact) and that no other party should share the blame. In this show the main theme was:
- Boeing is entirely guilty, knew the planes were doomed to crash, but sold them anyway to make an extra $5 bucks
- The government and FAA are great but were bamboozled by the evil corporate giant
- Congress is here to save you
- If a plane crashes it's the builder's fault, pilots never make mistakes, even if they do it's the plane builder's fault.
- But it's all good now because there's a whole new law on the books and Boeing was soaked by the gov for $2.5 Billion