Originally Posted by
WillowRun 6-3
Allied Pilots Association Opposes Extension of Equipment Exemption for Boeing 737-7 MAX and 737-10 MAX Aircraft
FORT WORTH, Texas (Oct. 5, 2022) – The Allied Pilots Association (APA), representing the 15,000 pilots of American Airlines, expressed its strong opposition to any extension of the equipment exemption for the Boeing 737-7 MAX and Boeing 737-10 MAX.
“Boeing needs to proceed with installing modern crew alerting systems on these aircraft to mitigate pilot startle-effect and confusion during complex, compound system malfunctions,” said APA President Capt. Edward Sicher. “Once these systems are installed and pilots have been properly trained on them, our crews will be better able to identify system failures and prioritize corrective actions that could save lives.”
“We oppose any extension of the exemption and don’t agree with Boeing’s claim that pilots could become confused when moving from an airplane without the modern alert system to one that is equipped with it. Nothing could be further from our flight deck reality,” Capt. Sicher said. “Consider the Boeing 757 and Boeing 767 – they’re substantially different airplanes, yet operate under a single certificate. Pilots have routinely flown both on the same day without any confusion
It is an interesting issue, however, the example of how an intermix can function without impact to the operator is not a brilliant choice. The function of the 757 and 767 is common. There are a few system differences between the two, but they talk to the pilot with a common architecture. If the M7 and M10 are going to talk a different language, there is the potential for unintended consequences with a mixed fleet.
The legacy alerting systems have had some areas of issues, such as the use of a sound alert for two different functions, assumption being that as one acts on the ground.... and the other above 10,000' perhaps the crews would not get discombobulated. That didn't pan out in the real world, and a new annunciator was mandated to add to the general visual "noise".
Where would enhanced alerting have made a difference? Would the B737-800W flop into Amsterdam have helped, for a failure of a LRRA that confused the ATR mode and was not picked up by the drivers? Only if it was darned smart, smarter than the designers, and certainly smarter than us mere drivers. Is the enhanced system gonna give wise messaging for that sort of deal? Or where the crew turn off the IRUs to sort out a minor deal, while in IMC? Will it pick up a throttle clutch pack that drops a THR lever during a power change? That would be an interesting logic diagram....
One of the smarter systems about was the A380-800 that had the whoopsie in SGP. There, the crew were inundated with pages upon pages of smart alerts that interrupted their processes, and didn't really help in the immediate actions of back to basics. The 777/787 has some of the best concepts out there, and on occasions, the same smart systems will set the crew off on a wild goose chase. Love the ECL, but occasionally, it isn't what you need. Oddly, the one time that I think the ECL and EICAS would have been very helpful, the FO couldn't read either the ECL, or the EICAS, and we were back to memory of where in the cockpit a couple of switches were.
Smarter systems are not a magic bullet, and if they cause interoperability issues, they may not be desirable for the legacy equipment. I would still think that concluding the Max 7 and 10 and drawing a firm line under any future expansion of the model line in any form would be in the industry, drivers, and manufacturer's interest. Don't have a dog in the fight, but prefer that an well developed, well tested new model starts to be considered. Right now, that would be problematic to the OEM and to industry, and the merits are marginal, and not without unintended risks.
Logically, it is questionable to be OK to fly the same machine with "inferior" systems in the morning, and then fly afternoon tasks with the "new improved" system... do passengers then have to ask the pilots when they last used the system that they are sitting in with said passenger? The OEM missed an opportunity to do a greenfield development following the NG, which was generally a very good program, with a couple of just awful issues that the OEM remains unaccountable for. The delay however has provided an opportunity to improve some matters such as composite damage tolerance, lightning protection etc... and perhaps to come up with a design that gets the Vs to a reasonable value, so we can stop digging jets out of the mud at the far end of the runway.