Boeing Believed a 737 Max Warning Light Was Standard. It Wasn't. (msn.com) 325
"When Boeing began delivering its 737 Max to customers in 2017, the company believed that a key cockpit warning light was a standard feature in all of the new jets. But months after the planes were flying, company engineers realized that the warning light worked only on planes whose customers had bought a different, optional indicator," reports the New York Times.
"In essence, that meant a safety feature that Boeing thought was standard was actually a premium add-on.... Because only 20 percent of customers had purchased the optional indicator, the warning light was not working on most of Boeing's new jets."
An anonymous reader quotes their report: After discovering the lapse in 2017, Boeing performed an internal review and determined that the lack of a working warning light "did not adversely impact airplane safety or operation," it said in its statement. As a result, Boeing said it did not inform airlines or the Federal Aviation Administration about the mistake for a year. Only after the crash of Lion Air Flight 610 last October did Boeing discuss the matter with the F.A.A. The company then conducted another review and again found the missing alert did not pose a safety threat, and told the F.A.A. as much...
Boeing detailed its initial confusion about the warning light in a statement released on Sunday, adding new details to what was already known about the flawed design and introduction of the 737 Max, its best-selling jetliner. The initial lack of knowledge about the feature's functionality, along with the delayed disclosure, add to the concern about Boeing's management of the Max's design... This light could have provided critical information to the pilots on two flights that crashed shortly after takeoff in recent months.
Boeing also apparently told pilots in one meeting that their alert would work on the ground before takeoff, so pilots would have time to abort the takeoff, according to the Times.
But now Boeing is telling pilots that the system won't alert pilots until the aircraft is 400 feet above the ground.
"In essence, that meant a safety feature that Boeing thought was standard was actually a premium add-on.... Because only 20 percent of customers had purchased the optional indicator, the warning light was not working on most of Boeing's new jets."
An anonymous reader quotes their report: After discovering the lapse in 2017, Boeing performed an internal review and determined that the lack of a working warning light "did not adversely impact airplane safety or operation," it said in its statement. As a result, Boeing said it did not inform airlines or the Federal Aviation Administration about the mistake for a year. Only after the crash of Lion Air Flight 610 last October did Boeing discuss the matter with the F.A.A. The company then conducted another review and again found the missing alert did not pose a safety threat, and told the F.A.A. as much...
Boeing detailed its initial confusion about the warning light in a statement released on Sunday, adding new details to what was already known about the flawed design and introduction of the 737 Max, its best-selling jetliner. The initial lack of knowledge about the feature's functionality, along with the delayed disclosure, add to the concern about Boeing's management of the Max's design... This light could have provided critical information to the pilots on two flights that crashed shortly after takeoff in recent months.
Boeing also apparently told pilots in one meeting that their alert would work on the ground before takeoff, so pilots would have time to abort the takeoff, according to the Times.
But now Boeing is telling pilots that the system won't alert pilots until the aircraft is 400 feet above the ground.
Believed, eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Or lied to save face? Which is more likely.
Re:Believed, eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
They really did think it was.
Which is worse than the alternative. They've demonstrated they don't know how their own plane works. The one they convinced the FAA to let them self-certify.
Re: Believed, eh? (Score:5, Funny)
This is the fault of excessive regulation. If not for that there would be hundreds of aeroplane manufacturers and if you die due to negligence, you can sue them for breach of contract.
Correlated failure modes (Score:5, Interesting)
There is a slightly different issue that affects many many devices, That's the correlated failure mode. This is when a secondary system is unbeknownst to the designer not an actual redundant safety backup but is doomed to fail at exactly the same moment the primary fails. So many systems have this defect in ways ranging from the subtle (built from transistors from the same manufactuing lot so defects are correlated) to the obvious in hindsight (e.g. thermal overload or voltage spike affecting both systems).
This isn't quite the same issue here but it's the same general outcome in which one is inadvertently blind to the lack of a failsafe condition under real failure modes despite trying to engineer that outcome.
Re: Correlated failure modes (Score:5, Insightful)
And the alert that was supposed to warn them didn't work as the safety system to trigger the alert wasn't built in.
Re:Believed, eh? (Score:5, Interesting)
The thing is the 737 is somewhat of a Frankenstein's monster at this point. The plane-line itself is over 50 years old, and what Boeing should have done at this point is just redesign a new plane from the ground up. But since updating the 737 has the upside of not requiring airlines to retrain/certify their pilots who're accustomed to fly the previous 737 models, this saves the airlines money and makes them more likely to buy the plane.
In 2010, Airbus launched its A320Neo line, which crushed the existing 737 in fuel-efficiency. In 2011, Boeing basically had to decide between long-term and short-term gains, and since the shareholders were angry over them bleeding money to Airbus, the design of the 737 MAX was fast-tracked, with emphasis on 2 things: fuel-efficiency and being as close as possible to the old planes so that no pilot retraining would be needed. Since achieving better fuel efficiency meant bigger engines, a problem arose: the wings on the 737 are so close to the ground (a feature, not a bug, this was initially done on purpose in the 1960s to make maintenance easier at airports that were in less developed countries) the engines had to be moved up and forwards to make them fit, which affects aerodynamics and the handling of the plane. Aware of this fact, the MCAS system was put in as a quick fix to 'patch' this problem, but since the plane was marketed and was supposed to behave exactly like the old 737s thanks to this system, Boeing intentionally chose not to make a lot of noise about the aerodynamics changes or the MCAS. After all, that would have ran the risk of the FAA and their equivalents in other countries requiring more extensive pilot training which would negate the selling point of 'it's the same old plane, just more efficient, give us your money!".
Those of us working in IT have seen this logic at work before: systems need to be updated to meet new demands, but as a cost-saving measure what is often done is that instead of designing a new system that actually serves the new requirements, the old system from the mid-90s that's held together by duct tape patches is patched and 'fixed' further, and at some point the legacy code underneath all of it just catches fire, and companies end up paying way more time and money fixing the fire than they would have if they just did the right thing and switched over to a newer system altogether.
It's good to keep in mind though that the fault is not just Boeing's alone. American airlines, that used to have an exclusive deal to only use Boeing planes, announced an order for 130 A320Neos in the summer of 2011, and at the same time told their investors that 'American also intends to order 100 of Boeing's expected new evolution of the 737NG with a new engine that would offer even more significant fuel-efficiency gains over today's models." The reason the quote said 'expected' is because that release was pushed out before the 737 MAX was even announced. American basically told the public about being willing to purchase a non-existing plane while they were simultaneously buying the competitor's products. That's basically them saying 'give us a better model of the ancient plane, or we'll switch over." And Boeing took the bait, the 737 MAX was announced in july 2011 and flew 5 years later. Fact is, the whole plane is a hacked together panic move that should have never seen production in its current shape. But thanks to the greed of both Boeing and certain airlines as well as the failure of proper oversight, here we are.
If people are interested in a bit more extensive history of the 737 situation, you can check a video titled The economics that made Boeing build the 737 Max' [youtube.com] by the Youtube channel Wendover productions (that does a lot of solid videos on logistics, and especially aviation) which I used as the basis for this comment.
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The Dreamliner and the A380 are wide-body (= twin-aisle) planes meant for long-haul routes between continents with high demand, whereas the 737 and the A320Neo are narrow-body planes meant for shorter routes within continents. A single Dreamliner costs around double compared to the 737 MAX 8, not to mention it's more expe
Re:Believed, eh? (Score:5, Informative)
You confuse several completely different airplanes for completely different tasks.
Here, this little cheat sheet might help you:
Short to medium range narrow body airliner
Airbus A320 - Boeing 737
A320 is way better than B737, but heavier.
A320 NEO moreso. Even than B737 MAX which was made to counter it.
Medium to long range wide body airliner
Airbus A330 - Boeing 787 Dreamliner
A330 is worse than B787, but really cheap.
A330 NEO is almost as good as B787 and still cheap, and is somewhat of a quirk of history.
Long range wide body airliner
Airbus A350 XWB - Boeing 777
A350 is better than B777, but somewhat smaller and quite expensive. A stretch might even kill the upcoming B777x that was made to counter the Airbus.
Which is funny because the A350 was originally supposed to counter the 787, not the 777.
Long range double deck airliner
Airbus A380 - Boeing 747
A380 is quite different to B747 and both are a dying species.
A380 far more pleasant for the passengers, but won't ever be a cargo airplane. Also its wing is too heavy (it was designed for a larger version that never flew) making the airplane inefficient.
The reality is, of course, much more complicated than that, but it is close enough.
Re:Believed, eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Indeed. They obviously have lost control of their product, likely due to unsuitable processes and too high complexity (and probably unqualified personnel). Makes them unfit to produce any kind of safety-critical devices and certainly unsuitable to produce passenger airplanes.
Re:Believed, eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Believed, eh? (Score:2)
Maybe 100 years ago. Most laws have been rewritten or interpreted to minimize liability to consumers.
Re:Believed, eh? (Score:5, Funny)
>> But now Boeing is telling pilots that the system won't alert pilots until the aircraft is 400 feet above the ground.
Yeah. A pity that most crashes happen at approximately 0 feet above the ground.
Re:Believed, eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
>> But now Boeing is telling pilots that the system won't alert pilots until the aircraft is 400 feet above the ground.
Yeah. A pity that most crashes happen at approximately 0 feet above the ground.
I don't know if that is supposed to be humour but if it is you accidentally made a valid point. Since the cause for most crashes is inadequate design, cost cutting, maintenance mistakes, training failures, lack of inspection, wilful omission of safety protocols, damage done by ground personnel, garden variety incompetence, etc. most crashes do indeed happen at 0 feet above the ground. The taking off and falling out of the sky bit is usually an entirely avoidable tragedy.
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It was a tautology. The crash happens when when the plane meets the ground. Why are you rambling on about causes?
Re:Believed, eh? (Score:4, Funny)
It was a tautology. The crash happens when when the plane meets the ground. Why are you rambling on about causes?
You must be a Boeing executive....
Re:Believed, eh? (Score:4, Funny)
You know the old saying, it’s not the Vf=Vi+at that kills you, it’s the F=m(deltaV/deltaT)
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The AOA sensors don't work properly unless there is some sustained airflow over them, but you should have a proper indication at or around 40 kts so having the indicator still misreading above that would give the aircraft time to abort the takeoff so it most definitely SHOULD be active on the ground.
Shocker (Score:5, Funny)
I am Jack's complete lack of surprise.
And what really cracks me up...... (Score:5, Interesting)
I hope families from the two MAX crashes can get the resources to sue Boeing's ass in U.S. Federal court.
New CEO for Boeing? (Score:5, Interesting)
Others are saying CEO Dennis Muilenburg shouldn't be both CEO and Chairman:
Boeing's CEO should be removed as chairman of the company's board amid its 737 Max crisis, a major shareholder advisor says [businessinsider.com]. (April 16, 2019)
Boeing Urged to Split CEO, Chairman Roles in Max Crash Aftermath. [bloomberg.com] (April 16, 2019)
Re:New CEO for Boeing? (Score:5, Insightful)
Others are saying CEO Dennis Muilenburg shouldn't be both CEO and Chairman
No public company should have the same person as both CEO and chairman.
The purpose of a board of directors is to be a watchdog on management. That doesn't happen when the board and management are both run by the same person. The watchdog becomes a lapdog.
Re: New CEO for Boeing? (Score:2)
Why not the CEO and chairman being the same
person? Itâ(TM)s working beautifully over at DXC Technology!
Re:New CEO for Boeing? (Score:5, Insightful)
The purpose of a board of directors is to be a watchdog on management. That doesn't happen when the board and management are both run by the same person. The watchdog becomes a lapdog.
And here I thought that the purpose of the board of directors was to give well paying cushy positions to already well paid CEOs so that they had company funded networking time in case they ever got laid off.
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I would say this is criminally-minded sabotage of oversight mechanisms. Why is this not illegal?
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well, I'd say unless they're the original founder of the company.
If they aren't willing to split the role, they should stay private.
You can get big on private equity. Uber has a valuation of $50B, and is private.
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In the Soviet Union, nothing of Soviet ingenuity, craftsmanship and general build could have a flaw. So anything that went wrong must have been human error, because Soviet technology was by definition perfect.
I guess we finally found out where the various engineers that were let go from the OKBs ended up.
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American components, Russian components. All made in Taiwan!
Boeing can do whatever they want (Score:5, Informative)
And the government will bail them out with your tax dollars. Boeing is too big to fail.
Billions in Pentagon Contracts [cnbc.com]
$14.2 billion [upi.com]
$5.7 billion [upi.com]
$605 million [upi.com]
$127.6 million [upi.com]
$65 million [upi.com]
$21.6 million [upi.com]
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Yeah, legit military gear contracts are totally a bailout or subsidy.
Re:Boeing can do whatever they want (Score:5, Insightful)
Well... they're taxpayer monies being given to a corporation to produce something the government says it needs, at the price the corporation sets. At some point said contractor becomes a massive mega-employer and US exporter.
So now in addition to any gaming/gouging that may go on, it's inherently and increasingly in the government's interest to keep giving them money and contracts, regardless of efficacy of operations or actual effective prioritized need.
If you can't see how that could become an issue, you're perhaps tritely under-thinking it.
Re:Boeing can do whatever they want (Score:5, Informative)
Yeah, legit military gear contracts are totally a bailout or subsidy.
Many of them are not legit. The KC-46 contract [wikipedia.org] was awarded to Boeing by congress, over the objection of the military which considered the Northrup/EADS proposal to be better on nearly every criteria, including price. It was pure porkbarrel politics. Boeing was handed an inflated payout for an inferior aircraft.
Re:Boeing can do whatever they want (Score:5, Interesting)
Yeah, legit military gear contracts are totally a bailout or subsidy.
Many of them are not legit. The KC-46 contract [wikipedia.org] was awarded to Boeing by congress, over the objection of the military which considered the Northrup/EADS proposal to be better on nearly every criteria, including price. It was pure porkbarrel politics. Boeing was handed an inflated payout for an inferior aircraft.
Even better, the Air Force had to halt acceptance (twice!) of the KC-46 airframes because they kept finding trash, tools, and other debris left over from production and assembly in the aircraft. They were finding the debris in closed compartments and also found areas using substandard materials. Boeing has been living high off the hog (gratuitous pun intentional) for so long that they are getting sloppy.
Re:Boeing can do whatever they want (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Boeing can do whatever they want (Score:5, Insightful)
The presidents lawyer gets prison for hush money to a hooker but airline executives get to be their own judge and jury and find themselves completely innocent after 180 die and they could have prevented the accidents but didn't.
How many are dead due to their indifference to safety? Where does the buck end?
FTA:
"The real reason Boeing's new plane crashed twice - Vox"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Test Plan template (Score:2)
This is your periodic reminder that your Test Plan template must include a Bill of Materials subsection.
How evil does one have to be? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:How evil does one have to be? (Score:5, Interesting)
The competent people who founded the company....they are all long gone.
The company is now run by all the toxic self-promoters who managed to backstab their way to the top.
This mess is their work.
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How evil does a company have to be to ignore safety of hundreds of people?
Hi, I see you're new here. Welcome to Earth! I hope you enjoy your stay...
They hired the baby cages woman (Score:4, Interesting)
Well they did just hire Nikki Haley, the UN rep who defended Trump's baby cages, to be on their board.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/former-un-ambassador-nikki-haley-lands-spot-on-boeing-board/
What do you do if you've screwed up big time and your planes fall out of the sky? You hire Nikki Haley, if she can defend taking toddlers from their parents, sticking them in wire mesh dog cages in a desert camp, and then losing track of 2000+ of them when the courts order their return, planes that fall out of the sky is trivial for her to defend!
Re:How evil does one have to be? (Score:5, Insightful)
It sounds more like incompetence than evil to me, but the level of incompetence is surprising. I'm not an aviation buff, and I don't follow the industry or its accidents particularly. But it's my understanding that in the past, aircraft have crashed due to malfunction of the pitot tube, which is an air speed sensor. One of the lessons that came from these crashes was that there should be multiple pitot tubes, and that there should be a system to notify pilots when one or more pitot tubes produced significantly different figures for air speed.
Why should the angle of attack sensor be any different? Why wouldn't it be standard that there be more than one, and that mismatches in their readings should alert the flight crew? Are these situations really that different? I feel like this is a pretty obvious safety measure to take, but am I just so naive to aircraft that I don't appreciate the difference?
Re:How evil does one have to be? (Score:5, Insightful)
It sounds more like incompetence than evil to me
Of course it was incompetence. Boeing is going to pay out WAY more in settlement money, retrofits, testing, and lost business than they ever would have paid to have done it right in the first place.
"Evil" makes no sense here, since there was nothing to gain.
If we are going to jail people for incompetence, then we are going to need a lot more jails.
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Depends on whether the guards remember to lock the doors.
Re:How evil does one have to be? (Score:4, Interesting)
I agree with you on basically all points. I also wonder, when does incompetence become criminal incompetence? When does the MBA-driven cheap-out cross the line? If a company gradually decreases engineer compensation until they attract only incompetent engineers, are we just supposed to be good capitalists and wait for the market to sort it out?
If the engineers were incompetent, then are they the ones who should be jailed? Or should the people who built a business strategy around hiring incompetent engineers be jailed? The people at the top are almost never considered responsible when things like this happen--their worst punishment is to take a golden parachute and go on to sit on the boards of other major businesses.
Re:How evil does one have to be? (Score:5, Interesting)
For those who haven't heard of it, when McDonnell-Douglas designed the DC-8 they wanted to maximize the usable space within the cargo bay by having a cargo door that opened outwards and would thus allow operators to fill the whole cargo space without having to leave space for the door to open. This obviously lead to a much more complicated door latching mechanism rather than the very simple self-sealing plug type that was used for inward opening doors. Unfortunately a number of design mistakes were made and it became possible to get the door to close and show the proper "door closed" message when it hadn't actually latched properly.
The mistake was identified during testing and an improved latching mechanism was introduced, but it didn't actually fix the problem. After this the plane went into service and it didn't take long for planes to start suffering serious accidents (including ones where the plane crashed killing everyone on board) because of doors that failed to latch properly blowing open mid-flight. So they implemented a fix, which consisted of writing instructions on the door, but only in English. Naturally another series of serious accidents occurred, the plane was grounded for a month and a proper fix was finally introduced with new door latches, an inspection window to make it possible to properly confirm the door had latched properly and instructions in multiple languages.
Because of this production of the DC-8 ended several years ahead of what was planned and McDonnell-Douglas' reputation, and sales for that matter, would never be what it once was. This bad reputation is also the reason why they just kept the old Boeing branding after the merger as if the McDonnell-Douglas company had never existed.
HOW CAN THE FAA LET THEM FUCK UP THAT BADLY? (Score:4, Interesting)
How can the faa let this happen. People need to do HARD TIME.
Isn't it obvious? (Score:3, Insightful)
"Industry can do no wrong." - GOP mantra
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Well, it would be more expensive, but at least it wouldn't kill me...
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So we should do without regulation? That would certainly at the very least reduce the cost for the aircraft manufacturers, because obviously the regulations don't ensure safe planes.
The problem with planes is that the people buying them are not the same people that are transported by them. With cars, you have quite some interest that the car you purchase is going to keep the passenger safe because you are the passenger. That connection does not exist with planes, here, essentially the cheapest crap could be
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They got killed by plane regulations? The average Joe, erh, Ivan couldn't even get a plane ticket.
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How can the faa let this happen. People need to do HARD TIME.
Solve the too big to fail airline / military industrial complex by feeding it to the prison industrial complex?
Is there anything the free market can't fix!
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Solve the too big to fail airline / military industrial complex by feeding it to the prison industrial complex?
Is there anything the free market can't fix!
If rich people had to go to prison, they'd fix it. And that's just what they've done... fixed the system so they don't have to go to prison.
If the populace were smart enough to absolutely demand that the wealthy suffer the same fate they do when caught committing a crime, you'd see the list of crimes pared down right quick. But alas, people get tricked into fighting one another for crumbs while the wealthy run off with the pie.
Sure it was standard (Score:5, Interesting)
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The MBA's decided to make the display of the angle of attack values from the sensors a paid extra.
They accidentally also bundled the AoA warning indicator with that paid option.
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Re:Sure it was standard (Score:5, Insightful)
It sure as hell wasn't an engineer that decided something like that.
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But it was surely someone at Boeing, so arguing "the company believed that" is still bullshit.
Re:Sure it was standard (Score:4, Informative)
You're presuming something was "decided," when actually it might have just been an engineering fuck-up where the indicator doesn't work if you didn't have the optional indicator.
The "Usual Suspects" here on slashdot are getting confused and wildly extrapolating, and then just presuming that their extrapolation must have been the facts in the story. This happens a lot, sadly.
What the mean journalist did was to say that Boeing thought it was a standard feature, but the actual result of their engineering was the same as if it had been a premium feature. But that isn't black and white enough for these neckbeards, they read that and conclude that it says that Boeing decided to make it a premium feature. Even though it actually implies that that has been excluded as a possible answer.
The article lists a whole bunch of fuckups by Boeing. Slashdot neckbeards though, they start hating so fast, they hate before they understand what the fuckups even were! And so they spew bullshit that isn't even true. Boeing fucked up so many parts of this process, it should be like shooting fish in a barrel to hate on them. But instead, we get the shit in this thread. This is slashdot. I hope there is a Hell, we deserve one.
Re: Sure it was standard (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not a warning light, it's indication on a multifunction display. If someone had actually decided to make it optional there should be some record of that. Barring any evidence of such a decision it's just as likely to be an honest mistake. The optional feature was supposed to be AOA indication; I could easily see the people involved in designing the system mistakenly making AOA disagree indication also optional.
This is also a rather stupid argument because pilots still had some indication when there was a serious AOA disagreement. Stick shakers are actuated by their associated AOA sensor. If one sensor is indicating a stall and the other one isn't, then only one stick shaker will activate. All it would take for them to sort out any confusion is for the pilot to ask the copilot "is your stick shaker working". And we know that the stick shaker functionality was working correctly because of the data from the flight recorders.
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AOA means Angle of Attack, for people as ignorant as me...
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Shit, not you again. Have you no shame.
Re: Sure it was standard (Score:2, Flamebait)
It's not; it's called "crew resource management" and is essential skill for any well functioning flight crew.
But in the case of these crashes the whole "AOA indication" thing is a red herring anyway since actually understanding what your sensors are doing is not your primary concern. Fixing the runaway trim is. The pilots in the first crash completely failed to do that. The pilots in the second crash succeeded, but then made the fatal mistake of turning the system back on. In neither case is there any r
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There are reports that without electric trim, it may not be possible to actually operate the manual trim using ordinary human strength. And there is no way to disable MCAS without disabling all electric powered trim.
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"we didn't install this particular bulb on the dashboard"
How about "bulb is installed but not connected to anything"?
A missing bulb would be rather obvious, wouldn't it?
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Runaway trim and MCAS are two different things no matter how much Boeing tries to gaslight it. In Runaway trim the trim wheels keep moving. In MCAS they move, stop for a while, move again. This appears normal as during flight the wheels are always trimming one way or the other. If you are busy flying the plane and noone has told you about MCAS you wouldnt notice that the trim is all going in one direction every time. The previous Lion air flight survived as they had a third pilot in the cockpit who noticed
LOL, "believed"? (Score:2, Informative)
It is as if someone else sold the aircraft that Boeing makes.
This is really getting ridiculous. What happened to this "accept responsibility for your fuckups" thing?
John Galt, why are you always around for the congratulations, but you always run away when you screw up?
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Only after the fact - "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" is a saying for a reason. But Libertarians hate any sort of prevention that doesn't come from free market fairy dust. And since you don't advocate for removing the immunity shareholders have from liability, you're also protecting the company's owners from real
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It is as if someone else sold the aircraft that Boeing makes.
This is really getting ridiculous. What happened to this "accept responsibility for your fuckups" thing?
John Galt, why are you always around for the congratulations, but you always run away when you screw up?
With all the subcontracting they are doing on aircraft like the Dreamliner that is actually a fairly accurate description. The Dreamliner outsourcing program was a huge failure of supply chain management. They just sat there with their thumb up their butt and assumed 1st tier suppliers would rigorously manage the 2nd and 3rd tier suppliers. That did not pan out. Boeing didn't properly qualify suppliers before handing out contracts, they ignored the warnings of the machinists union which actually predicted w
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That's not an excuse. It is still Boeing's product, and the responsibility to manage whatever production mode they choose. Not to mention that the idea that Boeing outsourced sales and marketing of their aircraft is a bit on the preposterous side.
Not acknowledging their responsibility is reprehensible and inexcusable.
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Doesn't instill a lot of confidence does it? (Score:3)
Are Boeing execs that insane? Besides being a huge cultural and technical blunder for Boeing, this is a huge PR problem that could literally sink them as a company. Certainly I was one who maintained that the 737 MAX problems could easily be fixed and the plane would be completely safe. But now to hear this kind of rubbish coming out of Boeing is just maddening and it will take a lot for me as a traveler to feel comfortable on the 737 MAX knowing Boeing execs apparently think this way. This kind of attitude seems permeate Boeing from the top down. The CEO and top brass should be hauled before a criminal court over this. I don't understand why they are saying these things at all. Can't they see they aren't helping themselves one bit? Better to stay silent, talk through lawyers, and put out an ideal fix, regardless of the time and cost, and hope people will forget. And who knows. In this era of politicians saying the most outlandish things, having regular scandals, and outright lying and getting away with it, people probably will forget in a few months, sadly, even with this.
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Are Boeing execs that insane?
I think it is more of a case of "nothing bad has happened, lets continue our strategy", until it does. A strategy informed by actual understanding avoids the catastrophe, one that is driven by greed and arrogance and lack of understanding does not.
What does "Boeing believed..." mean? (Score:5, Interesting)
What exactly does it mean when a "company believes something". Is it their CEO, majority of employees, or does it require that every single employee, from CEO to nigh watchman, must share that belief? Or does the OP mean to say "some people at Boeing believed something, while others believed something else".
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Re: What does "Boeing believed..." mean? (Score:2)
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Belief? When did engineering turn into religion?
When the CEO thinks he may be able to explain away a massive, probably criminal, screw-up.
If the airline uses Boeing aircraft... (Score:2)
...I'll choose another airline.
And yes, I have family and friends "across the pond", and fly from Toronto or Buffalo to the UK often enough to count.
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They are, but over here in Europe there's plenty of competition. It's quite possible to avoid the Boing-Boing Company.
Warning 'light' is not the main problem. (Score:2)
The layout of the display with the ‘Warning light’, and AoA indication can be seen here:
https://www.ainonline.com/avia... [ainonline.com]
The main system designs problem is that the B737 autopilot continues to use data that is faulty. (If the faulty sensor is connected to the active autopilot. Since this was the concept during certification in 1967)
This resulted in the dead of 9 passengers in 2009, due to faulty radar altimeter:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Other aircraft disconnect their autopilot in case of
Key cockpit warning light was standard feature? (Score:5, Informative)
a. Larger engines were introduced in the 737 Max that couldn't fit under the wing. These engines had to be mounted forward of and higher on the wing. Such a configuration introduced a pronounced nose-up attitude in the aircraft, especially at large thrust, like on take off.
b. A software fix was introduced known as MCAS (Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System) that engaged the horizontal stabilizer trim to bring the nose back down again.
c. This software-fix was done at the behest and advisement of Boeing management and rubber-stamped by the FAA.
d. This software fix didn't require the 737 air-frame to be re-certificated by the FAA or the pilots be retrained in the behavioral characteristics of MCAS. As such the pilots were not told of the existence of MCAS.
e. MCAS used a single AoA sensor located on the captains side, as using readings from both sensors would confuse the computer.
f. MCAS could automatically activate regardless of whether the auto-pilot was engaged or disengaged.
g. MCAS could be disabled using two switches except the pilots were never informed as to the existence of MCAS.
h. When MCAS is triggered, the pilots try and regain level flight using the trim wheel. This causes MCAS to be repeatedly engaged causing the aircraft to enter a continuous nose-up nose-down phase until the aircraft stalls and/or dives into the ground.
The Spin (Score:2, Insightful)
As bad as it sounds that "they thought it was standard equipment" this is probably spin the lawyers are coming up with as it's the least worst sounding offense that removes more guilt from executives than if they came out and said it was a line item for purchase. It's the PR show from here on out.
how complicated? (Score:2)
how complicated must your system design be if nobody knows for sure anymore how it works;
warning light is standard, yes/no? it works on the ground, yes/no?
i would expect those things to be very well documented somewhere, but it appears not to be.
What!?! (Score:2)
Don't Worry, Boeing Is On Top Of It (Score:3)
Bait & Switch OR Fraud? (Score:2)
IMHO, their best option was to tell the FAA and their customers, then correct the issue. Letting their customers know that there was a non-functioning feature that could hide a real problem seems to be the correct thing to do. Another option would be to immediately Turn On the option set that included this "included in the ba
upgrade migration path (Score:2)
You need to buy 737Max Server Edition to get those features.
400 feet? You're dead (Score:4, Funny)
"But now Boeing is telling pilots that the system won't alert pilots until the aircraft is 400 feet above the ground."
At 400ft AGL in a jet going 400mph, you're already dead, you just don't know it.
The light should just blink and say "GAME OVER".
The problem is deeper (Score:4, Insightful)
I have a theory that people have missed what is really going on as a root cause. Consider this: A philosophical theory developed in business a long time ago that one didn't have to know their industry, just how to manage generally. This has been fully embraced by many boards as those who were educated along those lines infiltrated all of the broader management roles.
Boeing used to be run, long ago, by people who deeply understood aviation, and secondarily understood "business". This has changed today. I'm going to be intentionally generous and say that the people running the company largely don't understand their product. This, however, is an explanation, not an excuse. Conscious decisions led to this state. Accountability must follow, or this will continue to happen.
Boeings reputation damaged (Score:3)
Boeing needs a top down change in management, they then need to admit Max was a collosial mistake. They neef to redesign plane from the ground up to be easy to fly without coding over aerodynamic flaws.
Its a aerodynamically flawed plane that requires fragile software to keep it from crashing, or alternatively is difficult for the pilots to fly. The aerodynamic flaw introduces the chance of sensor failures bringing down the plane which will require urgent procedures by the crew which should not be necessary. The culture inside boeing is completely flawed, their processes are flawed if this is what their processes give us. They have lied or close to it, they have withheld critical information from pilots, FAA and the public. The treatment of Pilots has been a big middle finger to pilots who fly this plane who Boeing is now treating as a problem that they cannot trust and from whom they with-hold information.
The pilot is there to make announcments over the PA system now. The plane decides for itself what it wants to do.
Profit motivations caused boeing to code over an unsafe design, and then to have to not diclose this, they did not mention MCAS in any manual, and provided no diagnostic light on it like AOA disagree or a way to turn off MCAS. If they had provided those things it would make the plane look more complicated and expensiive to train for.
You cannot turn off MCAS to this day, all you can do is kill the entire electric trim. But without the electric trim due to trim lock, strong air forces on the control surfaces, they may not be able to manually correct the trim that placed the plane into its dive that MCAS caused. There is a procedure for trying to unlock the trim, but its all risky business and should not have been needed in the first place because MCAS should not be needed.
Everything that boeing has done is about profits, it has withheld information and decieved. Its reputation is ruined. Nothing these people say can be trusted. If there is a safety problem they will cover it up, if there are major new things added to planes that could screw up, they will not tell people so if it does screw up, nobody can do anything.
It is not a safe plane and I would not want to fly in one from what is now known. Even with the software fixes, ir will still be safe. also, software fixes will not bring back all of the people they killed. Boeings attitude like, whoops, we killed 300 people, sorry about that, heres a software fix, we hope it wont happen again, trust us. They are using passengers as guinea pigs and are remorseless and have places profits over safety of passengers and what i see is they act like the loss of life was just a hiccup you have to expect with a new plane, no big deal, just move on. The company seems unfazed and seems to act like its just normal way of doing business to kill 300 people and then tweak the software like the lives lost gave useful information, and worth it for profits.
Boeing is a basketcase (Score:3)
If you are not convinced that Boeing cannot be trusted and has committed criminal negligence and very severe endangerments of safety, look at the problems with KC-46. They were trying to pull this on the US Military, the plans were full of trash, parts and tools when delivered. Also the KC-46 project ended up $3 billion over budget. If that doesnt convince you that basically Boeing planes are death traps, I dont know what will.
There may be more problems with Max we dont know about. As others pointed out, Max had trouble shortly after takeover before MCAS went active. These clowns withheld before, nothing they say can be trusted, who knows what they are not telling us.
The problem is they can claim to have learned their lesson but if you leave the same people in charge, it will happen again and they will cover it all up again.
Thats why the whole thing needs a top down shake down, the CEO needs to be fired. They need to as well admit Max is a failure and do a complete redesign of the 737 so MCAS is not needed.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Ah.. but it turns out there is more to it.
Everything you said is correct.
Unfortunately, the aerodynamic pressures on a mistrimmed 737 where it is trimmed nose-down and the pilot is pulling back to nose up are so great, it's not possible for a pilot to turn the trim wheel. Remember, those things are physical 'trim by physical wire and pulleys' to the jackscrew that tilts the horizontal stabliser. This has been true since the beginning.
How to deal with this - a so called roller-coaster manouver - where the [theaircurrent.com]
Link to the New York Times article (Score:5, Interesting)
New York Times article: Boeing Believed a 737 Max Warning Light Was Standard. It Wasn't. [nytimes.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Nyt paywall
Stop the paywall. (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Idiot. I am familiar with nyt's paywall scheme. It's still a paywall, hence the link to free alternate source.
Did I say idiot? Excuse me, only said it once. Idiot.
Re: (Score:2)
But you have to give it to them, they're WAY more efficient at killing people.
Re: (Score:2)
Granted, their body count is lower, but when you compare just how much time, personnel and effort is wasted in healthcare to kill people...