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Boeing Board to Call for Safety Changes After 737 Max Crashes
(Not sure whether this should be here or in the ongoing MAX thread.) Posted to the Times website a couple of hours ago:
Boeing Board to Call for Safety Changes After 737 Max Crashes For the past five months, a small committee of Boeing’s board has been interviewing company employees, safety experts and executives at other industrial organizations in an attempt to understand how the aerospace giant could design and build safer airplanes. The committee is expected to deliver its findings to the full Boeing board this week, and call for several meaningful changes to the way the company is structured, according to three people briefed on the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the report has not yet been submitted. The recommendations will include that Boeing change aspects of its organizational structure, calling for the creation of new groups focused on safety and encouraging the company to consider making changes to the cockpits of future airplanes to accommodate a new generation of pilots, some of whom may have less training. More |
If these last 3 paragraphs are any indication of the state of communication between Boeing and regulators, things are not looking good for the MAX flying soon: In August, Boeing met with officials from the F.A.A. and other global aviation agencies to brief them on its efforts to complete fixes on the Max. Regulators asked detailed questions about adjustments to the Max’s flight control computers, which the Boeing representatives there were not prepared to answer. Instead, the company representatives began to display a PowerPoint presentation on their efforts, according to people briefed on the meeting who spoke on the condition of anonymity because it was not public. At that point, the regulators ended the meeting. Weeks later, Boeing has still not answered all their questions. Talking past each other? Not a good sign. Must be missing something, I thought FAA was working closely on final fix details, getting ready to start test flights? |
Originally Posted by OldnGrounded
(Post 10570914)
(Not sure whether this should be here or in the ongoing MAX thread.) Posted to the Times website a couple of hours ago:
However, Boeings real problems are not in the aircraft, they are in the corporate managements failure to live up to their code of ethics. When they do an RCA and ascertain why they elected to act as they did with the QA engineers that discovered the non compliant parts being put onto the first years of the NG production from their supplier, then perhaps they will be able to implement appropriate changes. They appear to only respond to adverse outcomes instead of being proactive in maintaining the ethical standards that once upon a time they were famous for, rather than being infamous. Boeing has the technical competency and the ability to be innovative if they choose to be. For the last 40 years, a great deal of the innovation has been acquired by takeovers of other companies and their programs, which achieves the desired outcome, but can lead to organisational problems. However, the .767 Tanker ethics issues, the 737 production non compliance and their response, the MAX, 767 FOD, 787 production line concerns point to corporate changes being necessary. Boeing is still a global leader, but they could be working towards being the supplier of last resort as competent alternatives to their programs exist. The legacy holdover of the 737 has been forced mainly by the airlines, and that is probably reaching a logical end following the MAX debacle. Airbus went a smarter route with the CCQ, Boeing needs to go back to some basic assumptions as to what needs to be taught, and consider green field designs in the future that train for necessary differences, which frankly has little to do with flying the aircraft, it has a lot to do with the system architecture, for which the crew need a modicum of knowledge. To avoid excessive training overhead, the current variant, MAX holds over outdated system architecture. Yet the MAX event resulted from a lack of knowledge of the crew as to the existence and the function of the MCAS, and the historical issues with the manual trim, which would appear to contradict a position suggesting that generic training is appropriate. Each systems FMA should be fully known by the manufacturer, at the time of design. That would result in a requirement to observe a fault, and respond accordingly. MCAS was an "unknown unknown"... a failure of the FMA process in the design of the system. Applying (or mis-applying) the Pareto Rule, 20% of operators will benefit from having highly detailed knowledge on the systems and design, the other 80% want to know what page to turn to in the QRH. 100% are required by operating protocol to adhere to the QRH, and not go out doing heroic intervention from the get go. It is interesting to note that culturally, the groups that want or expect greater background information are those that also have the highest levels of individualism and the lowest level of compliance with formal procedures. The fundamental problem is not a technical issue, that is the glaring consequence. The problem is a cultural one that has been growing in extent for decades, and has been spack filled by the corporation to date. COOB, fix the root cause, stop fluffing around on the periphery of the problem; Nero's fiddle playing didn't help Rome (1). time for a Sapporo (1) In July, 64 A.D., the fiddle didn't exist, but citharas did. Nero had sung on sacking Troy, and Tacitus appears to have conflated the two by his writings: "pervaserat rumor ipso tempore flagrantis urbis inisse eum domesticam scaenam et cecinisse Troianum excidium, praesentia mala vetustis cladibus adsimulantem", [‘the rumour had spread that, at the very moment when Rome was aflame, he had mounted his private stage, and, assimilating the ills of the present to the calamities of the past, had sung the Destruction of Troy’]. Nero was 30 miles from Rome when the 6 day fire of July started ... but legend gives the parable of his playing an instrument that didn't exist for another millennia, a behaviour that is contrary to accounts by others at the time of his leadership in combatting the conflagration. However, it is a simple parable describing inappropriate interventions. |
Superb post fdr ..
the article also mentioned : Chris Hart, the former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, is leading a task force reviewing how the Max was certified.The report is expected to include about a dozen recommendations, with a focus on improving transparency in the certification process. Sometimes it is better to learn from the past and look and concentrate only at the future. |
A key point from the article, focusing on something discussed in some depth in these threads:
One of the report’s most significant findings concerns the reporting structure for engineers at the company. At Boeing, top engineers report primarily to the business leaders for each airplane model, and secondarily to the company’s chief engineer. Under this model, engineers who identify problems that might slow a jet’s development could face resistance from executives whose jobs revolve around meeting production deadlines.
The committee recommends flipping the reporting lines, so that top engineers report primarily to Boeing’s chief engineer, and secondarily to business unit leaders. |
Originally Posted by fdr
(Post 10570993)
A great development.
However, Boeings real problems are not in the aircraft, they are in the corporate managements failure to live up to their code of ethics. . That is entirely the fault of the Board, isolated in an Chicago tower far from any of the operations. They rely on corporate presentations to make decisions, but those presentations may be at variance with reality. Do note that this kind of separation of the leadership from the operations is also in effect in the defense sector, where most big firms are headquartered around Washington. There are obviously similar consequences there, but it is less visible. |
The plight of Boeing shows the perils of modern capitalism.
“The plight of Boeing shows the perils of modern capitalism. The corporation is a wounded giant. Much of its productive capacity has been mothballed following two crashes in six months of the 737 Max, the firmʼs flagship product: the result of safety problems Boeing hid from regulators.” https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...m-deregulation |
Want Human-Centered Design: Reorganize the Company.
“ Development is a series of tradeoffs, often with incompatible constraints. Multiple factors compete for attention, each factor often demanding a solution that is incompatible with that required by another factor. Marketing, engineering, usability experts all champion their favored approach, each correct in their assessment, but nonetheless, each voicing different and incompatible concerns. … success in the early stages of the technology marketplace favors technology-centered, feature-driven products. Customers clamor for more and better technology: engineers become experts at providing a stream of continual improvements in power, increased features, all at decreased cost. In this world, engineering rules the show. Engineers reluctantly cede a place for marketing, and the reluctance is quite visible. Marketing, moreover, becomes primarily feature-driven: query the existing customers for the features they desire most and pressure the engineering team to add them to the product, often with little regard, understanding, or even interest upon the impact on the coherence and integrity of the product. These are technology-driven customers, customers who purchase their products based upon technological accomplishments, upon novelty and lists of features. In the latter stages of a technology, the game changes considerably. The technology is taken for granted. Factors such as the total user experience play a major role: customers want convenience and lack of hassle. This new entry, user experience, is not well established. Nobody quite knows how to deal with it. The engineering team thinks it already understands user experience. After all, their previous customers were happy. The engineers themselves have no trouble with the product. Who are these new customers who need so much hand-holding? What’s the matter with them, anyway. The marketing group thinks it already understands user experience. After all, marketing is in close touch with the customer: it knows first-hand what they want. Do they want ease of use? Sure, add it to the list of features. Do they want an attractive product, sure, hire a graphics designer to make it look pretty. Each item gets added to the list of things to be accomplished, as if the total user experience were a feature like “more speed” or “more memory” that can be purchased or added on to an established design. … user experience is just another add-on … ease-of-use comes late in the game: after all, how can you make a product easy to use before it has been built? First we build it, say the engineers, then we bring in those user interface folks to add some graphics and menus and make it easy to use. … technical writers: how can you describe how to use a product until it is all finished, so there is actually something to write about? The writer’s job comes at the end. Marketing provides a list of essential features: the engineers state what neat new technical tricks and tools they are ready to deploy. The engineers build the device, putting as many new technologies to work as they can within their allotted time and budget, squabbling with marketing along the way over which of those features really matter and which don’t. Then after all is finished and the product ready to ship, call in the technical writers to explain it to the customers. Call in the graphics and industrial designers to make it look pretty. Call in the user interface experts to make it usable. Guess what: this process doesn’t work. … simply have to look around us at those high-technology products. “ … why so many telephone help lines are required, (but not available in flight). Read on … https://www.nngroup.com/articles-wan...nt-reorganize/ ‘The Invisible Computer’ Don Norman 1998 https://jnd.org Also https://jnd.org/people-centered-not-tech-driven-design/ If you can think of a clever solution in a few hours, assume many others have already done so. I learn more by being wrong than by being right It's not you. Bad (systems) are everywhere. Failures? No -- Learning Experiences Simplicity is in the mind Design for real people Don't be logical P.S. also ‘Being Analog’ https://jnd.org/being_analog/ |
Originally Posted by fdr
(Post 10570993)
The legacy holdover of the 737 has been forced mainly by the airlines, and that is probably reaching a logical end following the MAX debacle.
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Originally Posted by safetypee
(Post 10571375)
“The plight of Boeing shows the perils of modern capitalism. The corporation is a wounded giant. Much of its productive capacity has been mothballed following two crashes in six months of the 737 Max, the firmʼs flagship product: the result of safety problems Boeing hid from regulators.” https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...m-deregulation In a command socialist society Boeing would be commanded to continue. In the capitalist society people stop flying in the Max so air carriers stop buying the Max and the company building the Max suffers a financial loss. The companies that sell better aircraft start winning more orders. This is capitalism controlling the market to ensure better quality aircraft. Similarly, the company making a loss removes those who made the incorrect decisions, learns from their failures and works to regain market share. |
Originally Posted by Ian W
(Post 10571431)
It actually shows the opposite.
In a command socialist society Boeing would be commanded to continue. In the capitalist society people stop flying in the Max so air carriers stop buying the Max and the company building the Max suffers a financial loss. The companies that sell better aircraft start winning more orders. This is capitalism controlling the market to ensure better quality aircraft. Similarly, the company making a loss removes those who made the incorrect decisions, learns from their failures and works to regain market share. |
MBAs and Engineers
Upper management types consider themselves masters of the universe, cf. Trump's sharpie showing Dorian on track to hit Alabama and the attempted retaliation against NOAA truth tellers:}
Engineers (and other techies) understand there's no bending the laws of physics and math. To be honest, the aerodynamics folks have a much better record of success than the software folks – dead bodies are harder to explain away than failed software. I have seen several failed software projects. Management has the blinkers firmly screwed on and hangs on to MBA hallucinations. |
Originally Posted by EEngr
(Post 10571428)
I wonder about this. Boeing just needs to call their bluff. An airline that won't spring for a few hours of classroom and simulator time to learn a new subsystem isn't likely to start their flight crews from scratch with a side-stick.
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Originally Posted by Ian W
(Post 10571431)
The companies that sell better aircraft start winning more orders. This is capitalism controlling the market to ensure better quality aircraft.
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Originally Posted by OldnGrounded
(Post 10570914)
(Not sure whether this should be here or in the ongoing MAX thread.) Posted to the Times website a couple of hours ago:
.....to the cockpits of future airplanes to accommodate a new generation of pilots, some of whom may have less training. I can only trust that they then get serious on-type training when they move onto the big carriers, but they are essentially starting from zero. They must have unpredictable but fundamental gaps. |
One of many problems with the Grauniad story is that it gets history backwards. It was the pre-McMerger Boeing that hadn't had a peer competitor since the 1970s, a result of the suicide-pact development of the DC-10-10 and L-1011 - those were the last two all-new non-Boeing airliners launched in the US, 51 years ago. That was why Boeing could afford the massive overruns on the 777. Not until the late 1990s did Airbus really start to catch up and put some pressure on Seattle.
Neither was "classic" Boeing perfect: the Macs crew had nothing to do with the botched launch of the 737NG, the result of the "engineer-driven" culture's failure to fix a ramshackle system of configuration control that dated back to the Flying Fortress. That said: the current obsession with share price is not a good thing. Share price is an indicator of the company's worth, but when management focuses solely on share price, it's like a school "teaching to the test": buybacks and dividends are used to pump the price. |
The stock exchange has become so important for financing they even moved their group HQ from Seattle to Chicago to be closer to the east coast financial markets and media.
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Originally Posted by rightseatNsweating
(Post 10571897)
Having had some recent exposure to training/examination in parts of Africa, I do think part of the problem lies here. I see aviation schools churning 100s of students per year through a completely broken system. They learn to work the system which requires zero understanding of the basics, just a mix of corruption and rote memorization to get through laughable exams. It would not surprise me to find the same was happening in other parts of the world such as East Asia.
I can only trust that they then get serious on-type training when they move onto the big carriers, but they are essentially starting from zero. They must have unpredictable but fundamental gaps. |
Originally Posted by OldnGrounded
(Post 10571671)
What we actually have is an example of unrestrained capitalism destroying competition to the point that the "market" provides only two choices for purchasers of large airliners. It doesn't much resemble a "free" market at all.
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Originally Posted by Preemo
(Post 10572395)
Not to divert the thread, but aviation is not an example of unrestrained capitalism. The more regulation and red tape, the more socialistic the industry, and there are few industries with as much government involvement as aviation.
Back to Boeing. |
Originally Posted by Ian W
(Post 10571431)
It actually shows the opposite.
In a command socialist society Boeing would be commanded to continue. In the capitalist society people stop flying in the Max so air carriers stop buying the Max and the company building the Max suffers a financial loss. The companies that sell better aircraft start winning more orders. This is capitalism controlling the market to ensure better quality aircraft. Similarly, the company making a loss removes those who made the incorrect decisions, learns from their failures and works to regain market share. |
Originally Posted by Ian W
(Post 10571431)
It actually shows the opposite.
In a command socialist society Boeing would be commanded to continue. In the capitalist society people stop flying in the Max so air carriers stop buying the Max and the company building the Max suffers a financial loss. The companies that sell better aircraft start winning more orders. This is capitalism controlling the market to ensure better quality aircraft. Similarly, the company making a loss removes those who made the incorrect decisions, learns from their failures and works to regain market share. |
Originally Posted by triploss
(Post 10572282)
First post on this forum, and already trying to resurrect the bad pilots theory of the Ethiopian and Lion Air flights? Seems reasonable.
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Originally Posted by Tomaski
(Post 10572470)
I also think one can reasonably discuss inadequate training and adverse corporate culture without going down the path of labeling anyone as a "bad" pilot.
Recent comms by B.A. suggest an angle where the global achieved skill standard needs to be reviewed due to anecdotal evidence that assumptions about pilots capabilities the manufacturers and regulators hold are overly optimistic, upsets my stomach. It actually is true, though. Namely, Ethiopean had 2 and LionAir too many to count. Still there's a bad tail about such win-win statements, subtly suggesting the Runaway Trim NNC was enough to keep souls alive. Flying brick it wasn't! Our much beloved industry need Boeing to raise reborn out of all this, the ideas at the beginning of this thread need to be applauded and we all hold fingers crossed. |
[QUOTE=FlightDetent;10572486]Towards which I submit the following:
Recent comms by B.A. suggest an angle where the global achieved skill standard needs to be reviewed due to anecdotal evidence that assumptions about pilots capabilities the manufacturers and regulators hold are overly optimistic, upsets my stomach. It actually is true, though. Namely, Ethiopean had 2 and LionAir too many to count. Still there's a bad tail about such win-win statements, subtly suggesting the Runaway Trim NNC was enough to keep souls alive. Flying brick it wasn't! Our much beloved industry need Boeing to raise reborn out of all this, the ideas at the beginning of this thread need to be applauded and we all hold fingers crossed.[/QUOTE Hmmm... OK.... And Air France had, let's see, an off at Toronto, a splash in the Atlantic, and a huge number of other events. There was the forest pruning at Habsheim, and Air Inters FPA vs FPM into Strasburg. Those were all Airbus products, not Boeing, (there are sundry antics with Boeing by AFR as well along the way, Delhi, Papeete come to mind). In the period since the Max had issues, non ET and JT planes have gone off the end of runways in countries that are considered first World, English speaking... and we have splashed one or two as re runs of one of the pointed commentary events. Pan Am knew the 7 seas, they left debris in each one. The pilots we have today are the product of the desires of the industry. The pilot is not responsible for a standard being great or otherwise. Flying is a dynamic task, that requires engagement and participation by all concerned, not just the crew that get selected. Not picking on Air France in particular... But it doesn't have a lost in translation issue, and assuming that the ills of the aviation world today is due to the pilot, 3rd World, Boeing, does not hold up to any level of scrutiny. S. A. Maintenance is the pernicious, intractable issue, that dates back before the Red Baron took a. 303 round in a soft spot. Fix the root problem, not the symptoms. Other than in quantum physics, our universe has time flowing from before to after, so fix the root cause, which is not what most of the strident calls on this forum hold as causation. Before. >>>>>>> not before FD, if you think the ET crew didn't have a considerable HQ issue to deal with, which was not fully covered in the AD and NTC, then you should start reading the applicable threads again from the beginning, or have a chat with people who fly the737 or are involved in flight test involving HQ. Your jet manages to kill competent people today, that aren't out of Sea or Africa, including for loss of control, remember Excel at Perpignan.? |
Originally Posted by Tomaski
(Post 10572470)
I also think one can reasonably discuss inadequate training and adverse corporate culture without going down the path of labeling anyone as a "bad" pilot.
It is also a fact that the responses of the Ethiopian and Lion Air crews were less than perfect. None of us can be sure how we would have responded to the situations that they found themselves in. But particularly in the case of ET, there were (in)actions that in the cold light of day are hard to understand. I weep for the young ET FO apparently getting it right at first but subsequently doubting his own judgement. Dropping in and out of here for a while, I was triggered to post by the comment about Boeing being advised by their own board to design aircraft for less well-trained pilots. That may be a cynical ploy to keep the pressure on pilot error as the real cause, but we must work to maintain the reputation of the profession in the face of a growing tendency to portray pilots as robotic button pushers. |
fdr you seem to be arguing against things that I oppose myself. Hence the overall tone of you reply is a bit confusing, and there are chunks lost in translation I cannot make any sense of at all. Shall try to rephrase mine when there's bit more RnR time. Off to test the stickforces on Airbus approaching stall.
Oh, that. Could we please not spoil Boeing threads with (anti) Airbus-connected agenda, which you are actually very bad at? Just to reiterate we paddling on the same boat: AF of not so distant era deserves to be picked on by all means possible. |
If the aircraft manufacturers were operated under a socialist system, ownership, pricing, and
There. Fixed that for ya' Mac |
Originally Posted by Mac the Knife
(Post 10572893)
If the aircraft manufacturers were operated under a socialist system, ownership, pricing, and
There. Fixed that for ya' Mac |
Originally Posted by Tomaski
(Post 10572470)
I also think one can reasonably discuss inadequate training and adverse corporate culture without going down the path of labeling anyone as a "bad" pilot.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/18/m...gtype=Homepage |
Originally Posted by twochai
(Post 10573020)
Absolutely true - here's a very good piece in today's NYT from the great aviation writer, William Langewiesche 'What really brought down the 737 MAX?'
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/18/m...gtype=Homepage |
Originally Posted by OldnGrounded
(Post 10573047)
To me, Langewiesche's piece reads very much like pilot-blaming (especially blaming "third-world" pilots) with a strong slant toward minimizing Boeing responsibility for the MAX crashes.
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Some quotes"from the great aviation writer, William Langewiesche"...
Like thousands of new pilots now meeting the demands for crews — especially those in developing countries with rapid airline growth — his experience with flying was scripted, bounded by checklists and cockpit mandates and dependent on autopilots. He had some rote knowledge of cockpit procedures as handed down from the big manufacturers, but he was weak in an essential quality known as airmanship. Sadly, his captain turned out to be weak in it, too. Airplanes are living things. The best pilots do not sit in cockpits so much as strap them on. ... airline pilots who never fly solo and whose entire experience consists of catering to passengers who flinch in mild turbulence, refer to “air pockets” in cocktail conversation and think they are near death if bank angles exceed 30 degrees.... The worst of them are intimidated by their airplanes and remain so until they retire or die. It is unfortunate that those who die in cockpits tend to take their passengers with them twenty-five seconds later (a long interlude in flight), Harvino requested a clearance to “some holding point” where the airplane could linger in the sky. The request was surprising. The controller did not provide a holding point but asked about the nature of the problem. Harvino answered, “Flight-control problem.” He did not mention which kind, but before they die, pilots are rarely so descriptive. After both accidents, the flight-data recordings indicated that the immediate culprit was a sensor failure tied to a new and obscure control function that was unique to the 737 Max: the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS). The system automatically applies double-speed impulses of nose-down trim, but only under circumstances so narrow that no regular airline pilot will ever experience its activation — unless a sensor fails. Boeing believed the system to be so innocuous, even if it malfunctioned, that the company did not inform pilots of its existence or include a description of it in the airplane’s flight manuals. =The system in question is complicated, and we will return to it later, but for now it is enough to know that after the loss of Lion Air 610, the company suggested that the 737 Max was as safe as its predecessors. Its tone was uncharacteristically meek, but not for lack of conviction. The company seemed hesitant to point the finger at a prickly customer — Lion Air — that had several billion dollars’ worth of orders on the table and could withdraw them at any time. The dilemma is familiar to manufacturers after major accidents in which it is usually some pilot and not an airplane that has gone wrong. Nonetheless, Boeing’s reticence allowed a narrative to emerge: that the company had developed the system to elude regulators; that it was all about shortcuts and greed; that it had cynically gambled with the lives of the flying public; that the Lion Air pilots were overwhelmed by the failures of a hidden system they could not reasonably have been expected to resist; and that the design of the MCAS was unquestionably the cause of the accident. But none of this was quite true. The rush to lay blame was based in part on a poor understanding not just of the technicalities but also of Boeing’s commercial aviation culture. The Max’s creation took place in suburban Seattle among engineers and pilots of unquestionable if bland integrity, including supervising officials from the Federal Aviation Administration. After President Trump weighed in on the basis of no perceptible knowledge, and the F.A.A. was forced to retreat from its initial defense of the airplane, Boeing had to accept a public onslaught. The onslaught has included congressional hearings, federal investigations, calls for the criminal prosecution of Boeing executives, revelations by whistle-blowers, attacks in the news media, the exploitation of personal tragedy and the construction of a whole new economic sector built around perceptions of the company’s liability. Boeing has grown largely silent, perhaps as much at the request of its sales force as of its lawyers. To point fingers at important clients would risk alienating not only those airlines but others who have been conditioned to buy its airplanes, no matter how incompetent their pilots may be. Shocking. I hope this might be his last article. |
Not forgetting The Atlantic Dusts Off Discredited Conspiracy Theory to Accuse MH370 Pilot of Hijacking
Suicide-murder by the captain, in case anyone was wondering, according to Langewiesche. |
Originally Posted by OldnGrounded
(Post 10572446)
I don't want to diver the thread, either, but I need to point out that regulation in a capitalist economy is *not* socialism. If the aircraft manufacturers were operated under a socialist system, ownership, pricing, and probably the costs of labor and materials would be controlled by the workers/community/government. The same is true of operators, etc. We don't have that anywhere in the West.
Back to Boeing. Back to Boeing |
Originally Posted by maxter
(Post 10572461)
Or is capitalism in this case 'pushing the edges until the death rate becomes intolerable.' Surely there must be a compromise where we can have innovation but not at the expense of lives. I think we see too much going wrong across many industries where 'let the market decide' is not working well
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Originally Posted by DaveReidUK
(Post 10573089)
Not forgetting The Atlantic Dusts Off Discredited Conspiracy Theory to Accuse MH370 Pilot of Hijacking
Suicide-murder by the captain, in case anyone was wondering, according to Langewiesche. In the comments below today's Times article, posters who question Langewieshce's analysis are being asked (paraphrasing): Do you know who he is and who his father is? People often perceive expertise based upon fairly irrelevant factors. |
To be fair to Langewische, he is a decent writer and does actually know something about aviation, unlike most people who write about it. However he does seem to have taken a serious overdose of Boeing Kool-Aid here.
In fact, even if he were right that all right-thinking 'murcan pilots would have flown their way out of this (and there are certainly plenty of those who believe that) - it's STILL irresponsible (at best) to build an aircraft that can't be flown by 75% of the pilots who will get to do so. Suppose Toyota or Ford built a car that had 10x the fatal accidents of other cars, and their defence was "but the drivers just needed better training, it's terrible how under-qualified today's drivers are". I don't think that would go down very well. Maybe in 1960 it would have (the Renault Floride c. 1960 was indeed pretty much undrivable by normal mortals). |
Originally Posted by twochai
(Post 10573020)
Absolutely true - here's a very good piece in today's NYT from the great aviation writer, William Langewiesche 'What really brought down the 737 MAX?'
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/18/magazine/boeing-737-max-crashes.html A damning new report on the 737 Max blames 'inexperienced pilots' and the low-cost airlines who employ them — not Boeing |
Originally Posted by GordonR_Cape
(Post 10573687)
I was prepared to give Langewiesche the benefit of the doubt in only focusing on the pilots, but now mainstream media are using his article as 'proof' that the crashes were not Boeing's fault: https://www.businessinsider.com/737-...-report-2019-9
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