Originally Posted by
Big Pistons Forever
I would suggest that both MCAS accidents would not have occurred if the airplane was certified to modern certification standards. So yes in this case grandfathering 1960 certification standards directly lead to both tragic accidents. The airplane is full of systems that are completely uncertifable under today’s certification standards.
Also demonstrably false. MCAS met current certification standards - but
only because of some very bad assumptions regarding pilot reactions and training. MCAS failure was classified as "MAJOR" (classifications are MINOR, MAJOR, HAZARDOUS, and CATASTROPHIC). MAJOR failures are allowed to occur at ~10-5/hr (for example, 'routine' engine failures are considered MAJOR) - which basically means 'increased crew workload', and redundancy is not required. The regulations regarding such faults haven't materially changed in decades.
In 20-20 hindsight, MCAS should have been classified as
at least HAZARDOUS (and probably CATASTROPHIC) - which means probability of occurrence of 10-7/hr (or 10-9 for catastrophic) and require redundancy.
The problem wasn't the cert rules, it was the interpretation of the seriousness of the fault (which, to some extent, was hidden from the FAA).