Ethiopian airliner down in Africa

[yanrair]

Originally Posted by groundbum

Two crashes bad. Third crash - jail time for all involved. And I would mean top to bottom at Boeing and the FAA.

So lemme see. Boeing rushed some software in in a rush, in a couple of years due to the NEO threat. Now they've rushed some more software in, in a few months, and this is somehow better? Have they even started to write test plans for all the interactions with other systems? Started to look at the AD converters? Perhaps the Boeing board would like to spend next week strapped in a MAX cabin doing high speed touch and go's in Africa with the greenest crew from Ethiopian Airlines/Lionair, people with 50 hours each on type and a messed up sleep pattern on a plane fixed by the greenest mechanics going with airline bosses yelling to keep the schedule going regardless? Is the USAF/USN letting this new software go onto their 737 derivatives?

G

Where are you going with this Groundbum!! If you are suggesting that Boeing or Airbus have to make planes that can be flown "doing high speed touch and go's in Africa with the greenest crew from XXX Airlines/AN other Airlines, people with 50 hours each on type and a messed up sleep pattern on a plane fixed by the greenest mechanics going with airline bosses yelling to keep the schedule going- regardless?", then who are you blaming? Clearly the airlines are responsible in this case and I would not want to fly with an airline like that. There are many like this and they are listed here and I would not fly with them.
https://ec.europa.eu/transport/modes...-ban/search_en
However I think you have to expect the manufacturer to make planes intended to be flown by competent pilots who can deal with most anything that comes along, as it does daily, and sometimes extraordinary events ( BA 747 quadruple engine failure; Hudson; 767 Gimli Airfield; BA 777 Heathrow; hundreds of others that are out there). And we expect National Authorities to regulate their airlines properly and the airlines to manage them properly so that the scenario you describe should not occur. It is why we should have highly trained pilots and two of them.
I feel that there is a lot of discomfort among some on this forum to accept that pilots need to know what they are doing and to stay ahead of the plane. A plane is not a play station, much as some would like it to be, and I for one believe that to try and make it into one is a bad move.
A superior pilot is one who uses his superior judgement to ensure he never has to exercise his superior skill!! I am not sure that should be changed.

Cheers
Y

[BobM2]

Very well said, YANRAIR. There are probably a few more that should be added to the Ban List

[MemberBerry]

Originally Posted by yanrair

I feel that there is a lot of discomfort among some on this forum to accept that pilots need to know what they are doing and to stay ahead of the plane.

I feel there is also discomfort among some others on this forum to accept that even pilots that "know what they are doing" might not have been able to save the Lion Air or the Ethiopian flights.

My discomfort is with the constant claims that a "competent pilot" would have identified and solved the problem immediately, and the insinuations that the crews from those two flights "didn't know what they were doing".

Until we get the final reports from the investigating teams, it's the other way around: WE don't know exactly what those crews were doing.

I'm not saying those pilots didn't make mistakes, it's quite possible they did, after all it was a stressful and confusing situation. It would actually be surprising if they did everything perfectly.

But so far I didn't see any evidence suggesting a training deficit of those pilots, compared to pilots from other airlines. If that's true, it means it is not impossible this could have happened to pilots from US or European airlines. There are even some people that claimed it couldn't have happened to European and US crews, because of their better training. I think we don't have enough evidence, and it's way to early for such claims.

[bsieker]

Originally Posted by Water pilot

That has got to be one of the most lame PR exercises that I have ever seen and betrays a lack of an engineering mindset at America's premiere aerospace company. ...

"Lack of engineering mindset." Yes.

Even the first sentence struck me: "pilots from different airlines met with Boeing executives" ...,

Boeing executives. Not Boeing engineers.

Bernd

[Organfreak]

Originally Posted by bsieker

"Lack of engineering mindset." Yes.

Even the first sentence struck me: "pilots from different airlines met with Boeing executives" ...,

Boeing executives. Not Boeing engineers.

Bernd

I think that tells us that Boeing considers this to be, first and foremost, a PR problem, not an engineering one. I grew up with Boeing in my backyard but now I am disgusted. When they bought MD and took onboard a bunch of MD executives, their fatal dive began at that moment.

[bsieker]

Originally Posted by safetypee

Why would any operator need to experience a Lion MCAS event if the purpose of the ‘fix’ is to prevent such a failure, or at least its severity.

It is a futile, and ultimately embarrassing and revealing attempt to show to the world that "the airplane was perfectly safe before, but to cater to idiot third-world pilots, which we didn't even invite, we make it even safer!"


No, this isn't my opinion, this is how the lame excuse for a news article in the NYT reads to me.

Bernd

[clearedtocross]

Thank you, MemberBerry, how very true!

[bsieker]

Originally Posted by MemberBerry

Until we get the final reports from the investigating teams, it's the other way around: WE don't know exactly what those crews were doing.

I'm not saying those pilots didn't make mistakes, it's quite possible they did, after all it was a stressful and confusing situation. It would actually be surprising if they did everything perfectly.

But so far I didn't see any evidence suggesting a training deficit of those pilots, compared to pilots from other airlines. If that's true, it means it is not impossible this could have happened to pilots from US or European airlines. There are even some people that claimed it couldn't have happened to European and US crews, because of their better training. I think we don't have enough evidence, and it's way to early for such claims.

I think that point of view is exactly right. More importantly even than to know what those flight crews were doing is to make a useful theory of why they did what they did. After we figured out what they did, which should be relatively straightforward from the recordings.

The very few cases of suicide notwithstanding, it is practically always the case that to professional operators suffering an accident (pilots, ship captains, train drivers, excavator operators, chemical plant engineers, ...) what they were doing made sense at the time. Only with hindsight does it seem obvious that it was wrong, and once we know the "correct" solution it seems impossible to miss. But we cannot really evaluate the situation they were in at the time.

I hope Professor Dekker won't mind if I use a small picture from his highly recommended book The Field Guide to Understanding "Human Error" (quotes original) to illustrate:


(2009 Sidney Dekker)


Bernd

[kenish]

Question for the pros from a private pilot (and sorry if this was answered in the thread and I didn't see it):

How often do flight crews experience a stall warning (stick shaker, aural warning, etc) in normal Part 121 flying? I would guess it's very rare.

[repulo]

Originally Posted by kenish

Question for the pros from a private pilot (and sorry if this was answered in the thread and I didn't see it):

How often do flight crews experience a stall warning (stick shaker, aural warning, etc) in normal Part 121 flying? I would guess it's very rare.

Never.

In the EASA environment it should be trained regularly during the OPC/ProfCheck in the SIM.

[BobM2]

Originally Posted by kenish

How often do flight crews experience a stall warning (stick shaker, aural warning, etc) in normal Part 121 flying? I would guess it's very rare.

Frequently, every 6 months in simulator sessions, never in line flying.

[island_airphoto]

Originally Posted by kenish

Question for the pros from a private pilot (and sorry if this was answered in the thread and I didn't see it):

How often do flight crews experience a stall warning (stick shaker, aural warning, etc) in normal Part 121 flying? I would guess it's very rare.

Even in a C-172 I would not normally have any stall buffeting or warnings going on with paying passengers. They tend not to like it If you are a recent PPL, stalls seem like so much of your recent training it might seem odd you can not stall any airplanes for months or years if you don't want to, checkrides of various types excepted.

[island_airphoto]

https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/...-boeing-crisis
>>
When the Lion Air crash of a Boeing 737 MAX 8 revealed the existence of a flight control system operating in the background, which Boeing and the FAA had not revealed when the MAX 8 was introduced, pilots felt betrayed, as if Boeing had secretly abandoned its guiding design principle and lost faith in pilot skills. In actuality, Boeing’s trust in pilot skills likely buoyed a system design and roll-out strategy that appears to be at the root of two recent MAX 8 crashes. Boeing’s critical mistake may be in assuming a worldwide standard of pilot competency that doesn’t exist.
>>
I ran across this today. One theory is that of course American pilots are good enough to deal with runaway trim, so Boeing figured no big deal

[FCeng84]

Originally Posted by island_airphoto

https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/...-boeing-crisis
>>
When the Lion Air crash of a Boeing 737 MAX 8 revealed the existence of a flight control system operating in the background, which Boeing and the FAA had not revealed when the MAX 8 was introduced, pilots felt betrayed, as if Boeing had secretly abandoned its guiding design principle and lost faith in pilot skills. In actuality, Boeing’s trust in pilot skills likely buoyed a system design and roll-out strategy that appears to be at the root of two recent MAX 8 crashes. Boeing’s critical mistake may be in assuming a worldwide standard of pilot competency that doesn’t exist.
>>
I ran across this today. One theory is that of course American pilots are good enough to deal with runaway trim, so Boeing figured no big deal

Here we are 15 days and 2500+ posts into a thread about an accident for which we have not yet seen the FDR info nor heard anything about the crew conversations from the CVR and we are already saying that system design and roll-out strategy appears to be at the root of that accident?! We need that data before any sense of the root cause can be put forth as anything other then conjecture. Without the Lion Air accident we would at this point have no idea what brought the Ethiopian 737MAX down. As a result of having had the Lion Air accident many people seem to assume that the Ethiopian event was a repeat.

Can anyone with direct knowledge of what the Ethiopian FDR reveals describe specifically how and why then think this accident is similar to the Lion Air accident in a manner that would point to "system design and roll-out strategy" as having played a role?

[PJ2]

Originally Posted by bsieker

I think that point of view is exactly right. More importantly even than to know what those flight crews were doing is to make a useful theory of why they did what they did. After we figured out what they did, which should be relatively straightforward from the recordings.

The very few cases of suicide notwithstanding, it is practically always the case that to professional operators suffering an accident (pilots, ship captains, train drivers, excavator operators, chemical plant engineers, ...) what they were doing made sense at the time. Only with hindsight does it seem obvious that it was wrong, and once we know the "correct" solution it seems impossible to miss. But we cannot really evaluate the situation they were in at the time.

I hope Professor Dekker won't mind if I use a small picture from his highly recommended book The Field Guide to Understanding "Human Error" (quotes original) to illustrate:


(2009 Sidney Dekker)
Bernd

Hi Bernd;
I'm sure Professor Dekker won't mind a bit!

As you'd know, he also states, "What (you think) should've happened cannot explain people's behaviour", (The Field Guide to Understanding "Human Error" - Dekker, Ashgate, 2006). In fact, rather than possessing pilot licences, this specific book among all of Dekker's excellent works should be required reading as a condition of PPRuNe participation! ;-)

BTW, I fully agree with you regarding your views on AoA. AoA is for downstream equipment to use. Even though it appears to be obvious, I don't think AoA is the magic bullet some make it out to be and I don't think the case has been demonstrated for it's inclusion in an already-crowded PFD. In fact, there are no saves on record that occurred as a result of pilots knowing their AoA.

The question is, why did two AoA sensors, the one from the flight previous to the accident flight, and, (after having been changed), the accident flight AoA sensor have the same, identical incorrect AoA value? I've looked in the AMM - the installation is "keyed" so an incorrect install is unlikely, and the test procedures are thorough. Even if, hypothetically, not done, I am informed that these sensors are rarely wrong. Also, while poor operation of the loading bridge can possibly damage the left AoA, all such instances have been caught on the walkaround. (For those who don't know the aircraft, the AoA sensor is well forward of the L1 door).

PJ2

[SquintyMagoo]

Originally Posted by safetypee

Why would any operator need to experience a Lion MCAS event if the purpose of the ‘fix’ is to prevent such a failure, or at least its severity.

There's no evidence that MCAS was implemented to prevent any failure which befell Lion Air. That is, no one has yet suggested the Lion Air crash was caused by a stall, which is what MCAS was designed to prevent.

[BobM2]

Originally Posted by PJ2

The question is, why did two AoA sensors, the one from the flight previous to the accident flight, and, (after having been changed), the accident flight AoA sensor have the same, identical incorrect AoA value?

PJ2

You need to reread the preliminary report on JT610. The left AOA sensor was replaced prior to JT043 on the evening prior to the crash. Despite its malfunction on that flight, it was neither written up nor replaced prior to JT610 the next day.

[yanrair]

Originally Posted by FCeng84

Here we are 15 days and 2500+ posts into a thread about an accident for which we have not yet seen the FDR info nor heard anything about the crew conversations from the CVR and we are already saying that system design and roll-out strategy appears to be at the root of that accident?! We need that data before any sense of the root cause can be put forth as anything other then conjecture. Without the Lion Air accident we would at this point have no idea what brought the Ethiopian 737MAX down. As a result of having had the Lion Air accident many people seem to assume that the Ethiopian event was a repeat.

Can anyone with direct knowledge of what the Ethiopian FDR reveals describe specifically how and why then think this accident is similar to the Lion Air accident in a manner that would point to "system design and roll-out strategy" as having played a role?

Hi there FCeng
I realise that this thread is called Ethiopian ....... etc but it seems to be really about both accidents.
As far as I know nobody has that information other than the French BEA and presumably the Ethiopian authority. Assuming the recorders were not damaged. And nothing has been revealed so far. We don't know if the failure modes were the same or what the crew response was. Do we? Like you I am keen to know.
It seems a long delay between getting the FDR to France and the release of any data.
Has it been suggested somewhere here that we know what happened to Ethiopian? The Lion Air prelim. report is out and I thought that we were discussing that one in some detail, since we know a lot of what happened. And the rest about Ethiopian speculation?
The way aviation stays safe is for us to learn from every incident, find out what happened immediately and ensure that everyone knows how to avoid that particular trap next time. So, we have the flight the day previous to the Lion Air crash, , which may have provided valuable lessons perhaps. We shall see. There may, I say may since all flights of the Max since it came into service have live Flight Data Recording which would l am pretty sure throw up and previous examples of this sort of failure mode. Or MOR pilot reports of similar events. It would be very sad if others had experienced the same events, successfully dealt with them however difficult, and not passed on that knowledge into the gene pool.
Ethiopian did have some knowledge because they issued a notice to all their pilots referring to Lion Air and the Boeing advice. But the failure mode may have been completely different could it not?
If you read through some of the 2500 odd posts , a lot of them are cut and paste from Internet, Newspaper " sources" and other media feeds. Some of the commentary is first class but it can be hard for readers sometimes to sort through it. And then some things have been fully discussed days or weeks ago, only to resurface because we have not had time to read the whole 2500 posts. That is the nature of these forums.
But I have learned a lot over the last few days about the functioning of these systems, regulatory oversight, and probably most important, how many different views there are out there. All valuable. Except Boeing bashing in my view. The historic accident rate for Boeing is very low and pretty much the same as Airbus.
Let us all hope that the reports will reveal what happened in full detail and permit the 737 Max back where it belongs. With any shortcomings in any system, human or mechanical or electronic sorted out.

[yanrair]

Originally Posted by BobM2

Frequently, every 6 months in simulator sessions, never in line flying.

I can think of quite a few including a 747 at XXX stalling in the holding pattern 7000 feet, and good stall recovery but, very close call with planes below. I will look for others but I think there are many.
Turkish at AMS comes to mind right away
Cheers
Y

[VicMel]

Originally Posted by Ian W

They have a lot of confidence rebuilding to do. It would seem there is a lot of hostility too.

Boeing first needs to get over the first high hurdle of gaining confidence in MCAS. As a former aviation safety assessor, I find it incredulous that even if Boeing had decided the MCAS software was only DO-183C Level C (when the evidence now shows it should have been Level A), there was still no-one in their organisation (from QA to coders) who pointed out having software directly control the stabiliser based on the use of only one sensor is a very bad idea! Perhaps someone did and they were told (in no uncertain terms), ‘the pilot will cope’. Perhaps ‘someone’ suggested it might be a good idea if MCAS was disabled when GPWS was active or altitude was less than, say 500 feet, but was ignored. I have little confidence in the robustness of the MCAS software to the extent that I think it could now be a ‘prime suspect’. The probability of the same hardware failing on three different flights, especially as on JT043 no fault was found, seems to me unlikely. The MCAS software might not have been thoroughly scrutinised and tested for possible software self corruption, overflows, processor overload, never ending loops, interrupts clashing etc, etc. It could be that a large value of AoA caused a value overflow in the software leading to arbitrary behaviour of the MCAS. However, whatever the root cause of the failure turns out to be, the problem still remains that a non Level A software package can control the stabiliser. Regardless of whatever patch(s) are introduced, at some time in the future there is an unacceptable probability that a bug could emerge causing the MCAS to continually demand a ‘nose down’.