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US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

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Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#261

Post by Recurecur »

easytiger wrote: post #244
CaptainZapp wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You conveniently forgot to mention that the captain of the flight was highly experienced with 8'000 hours of flight time.

8000 hours on type? Or 8000 hours on safari tourist drops. He was only 28 years old. The sums barely add up, and only then as an exceptional case

@CaptainZapp

Thanks for that information. I was having trouble crediting a 28 year old with 8,000 flight hours...

That said, it's very likely a big chunk of that wasn't on 737s, or even large commercial jets.

Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#262

Post by seszett »

rbanffy wrote: post #222
keiferski wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Near Addis Ababa, Ethiopia — At least eight of the victims of the Ethiopian Airlines crash were confirmed Tuesday to have been Americans, including Melvin and Bennett Riffel from Redding, California. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ethiopian-airlines-crash-victim...

How is that relevant in FAA's decision not to ground the planes? Do you think they'd ground the planes if the majority of the victims were American?

The original post in this thread said:

> all the FAA can be thankful of is the dead are foreigners so it’s unlikely they’ll be held properly accountable

and that's what the answers are responding too, saying it's wrong and there are American victims as well.

Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#263

Post by julianlam »

Recurecur wrote: post #259
cesarb wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Pretty sure the data is that two planes crashed in five months in perfect weather conditions Not only that, but the data we have so far from the second crash (ADS-B data showing irregular vertical speed, see https://www.flightradar24.com/blog/flightradar24-data-regard... ) is consistent with both accidents having a similar cause. Grounding all airplanes from the same model until preliminary data from the (already r…

If it was a "similar cause", it is absolutely pilot error. The MCAS system, at fault in the first crash, may be disabled via a cockpit control. In other 737s, moving the stick was sufficient to disengage it. For some reason, this was changed in the Max, and you must use the other control. However, any competent pilot would know every control in the cockpit. The captain of the latest flight to crash allegedly had 8,00…

Unless I am mistaken, the regular 737s do not have the MCAS installed,just the MAXs (https://theaircurrent.com/aviation-safety/what-is-the-boeing...)

Additionally it has been suggested that documentation for this physical switch is not well laid out or presented in the manual because Boeing was confident that it would simply stay out of the pilot's way during flight.

Assuming pilot error would seem to be premature if these points are in fact true.

Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#264

Post by fps_doug »

_cerv wrote: post #45

Some points from personal experience from working at Boeing, family working at Boeing, and a close friend on the flight line for the 737-8; - not everything is back from the Lion Air incident, but internally there was strong confidence that a lack of pilot familiarity with the adjusted mechanics of MCAS contributed to the disaster - reproducing these failures has been extremely hard and has required a lot of cooperat…

> - not everything is back from the Lion Air incident, but internally there was strong confidence that a lack of pilot familiarity with the adjusted mechanics of MCAS contributed to the disaster

Sure, if there's a probability you were involved in developing a potentially flawed system that killed hundreds, the natural reaction is to not accept this and blame someone or something else. And it's not suprising that "internally there was a strong confidence" – nobody there wants to be the one saying "uh, I think we messed up here guys". Boeing is a total echo chamber at this point.

It's interesting you mention the MCAS here since...

> - training for the 737-8 and -9 was just short of non existent because in practice, these planes don’t fly differently.

If this were true, the adjustment shouldn't even matter, since the sole purpose of it is to make the plane behave exactly the same way as the old 737, so that the pilots don't have to go through lengthy training for the new plane.

You were trying to patch up changes to the hardware by adding software, so the hardware would feel the same. You claim you have achieved exactly that. But at the same time, you blame pilots for not reacting properly to those changes you made to the new plane compared to the old one. What?

Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#265

Post by CydeWeys »

Kipters wrote: post #146
Animats wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody knows why this plane crashed. The flight recorders have just been recovered and so far there has been nothing in the news about what was on them. Yes. And the recorders have angle of attack data. We'll know within days if it's another AOA sensor problem. Southwest, the biggest US operator of 737 MAX aircraft, bought the "AOA Disagree" option on their aircraft, and recently added an AOA indicator. Many operator…

> Southwest, the biggest US operator of 737 MAX aircraft, bought the "AOA Disagree" option on their aircraft...If you have that, you get a warning that the flight control system is seeing bogus AOA data How can something that important be an option?

It's starting to seem like the plane is not safe to fly without that option (and potentially some other changes that haven't been finalized yet). I'm surprised; I thought that the "nothing at the expense of safety" ethos was still followed in the airplane industry.

Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#266

Post by mjburgess »

julianlam wrote: post #263
Recurecur wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it was a "similar cause", it is absolutely pilot error. The MCAS system, at fault in the first crash, may be disabled via a cockpit control. In other 737s, moving the stick was sufficient to disengage it. For some reason, this was changed in the Max, and you must use the other control. However, any competent pilot would know every control in the cockpit. The captain of the latest flight to crash allegedly had 8,00…

Unless I am mistaken, the regular 737s do not have the MCAS installed,just the MAXs ( https://theaircurrent.com/aviation-safety/what-is-the-boeing... ) Additionally it has been suggested that documentation for this physical switch is not well laid out or presented in the manual because Boeing was confident that it would simply stay out of the pilot's way during flight. Assuming pilot error would seem to be premature…

Either way "pilot error" is defined with reference to some "reasonable level" of competence with the aircraft.

If multiple pilots are making the same error the issue is with the aircraft changes, not the "reasonable competence".

Ie., its redesign hasn't been thought through properly

Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#267

Post by bret791 »

Recurecur wrote: post #259
cesarb wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Pretty sure the data is that two planes crashed in five months in perfect weather conditions Not only that, but the data we have so far from the second crash (ADS-B data showing irregular vertical speed, see https://www.flightradar24.com/blog/flightradar24-data-regard... ) is consistent with both accidents having a similar cause. Grounding all airplanes from the same model until preliminary data from the (already r…

If it was a "similar cause", it is absolutely pilot error. The MCAS system, at fault in the first crash, may be disabled via a cockpit control. In other 737s, moving the stick was sufficient to disengage it. For some reason, this was changed in the Max, and you must use the other control. However, any competent pilot would know every control in the cockpit. The captain of the latest flight to crash allegedly had 8,00…

Depending on the situation, disabling autopilot is not the correct thing to do. That was identified as a contributing factor in TransAsia 235 https://www.asc.gov.tw/upload/cont_att/9b051632-ebf6-427f-b0...

Through simulations they think a crash would have actually been avoided had autopilot been left on.

Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#268

Post by CydeWeys »

Legogris wrote: post #53

I don't get it. Airline workers, Ted Cruz, Mitt Romney and democratic senators are for suspending it, which China, the EU and Australia have already done. What's going on at the FAA?

All the listed people are in the legislative branch. The FAA is part of the executive branch. Short of passing a law that grounds the 737 MAX, legislators don't really have a say here.

Interestingly, Trump has also come out against the plane, but his uninformed Twitter ramblings are by and large (rightfully) ignored by the executive branch. And he's not against the 737 MAX for valid reasons, but for luddite ones.

Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#269

Post by wastedhours »

Recurecur wrote: post #259
cesarb wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Pretty sure the data is that two planes crashed in five months in perfect weather conditions Not only that, but the data we have so far from the second crash (ADS-B data showing irregular vertical speed, see https://www.flightradar24.com/blog/flightradar24-data-regard... ) is consistent with both accidents having a similar cause. Grounding all airplanes from the same model until preliminary data from the (already r…

If it was a "similar cause", it is absolutely pilot error. The MCAS system, at fault in the first crash, may be disabled via a cockpit control. In other 737s, moving the stick was sufficient to disengage it. For some reason, this was changed in the Max, and you must use the other control. However, any competent pilot would know every control in the cockpit. The captain of the latest flight to crash allegedly had 8,00…

> If it was a "similar cause", it is absolutely pilot error.

That's a very blunt argument to make. Do watch the below video - I'm not educated as much on these matters, but the pilot here makes a compelling point as to why it could be from the Lion crash: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfQW0upkVus

He makes reference to the system for disabling not being included in the type training for the MAX, and given there wasn't an update on the fix for the issue (read that this is partly due to the US government shutdown meaning Boeing and the FAA didn't have as direct comms channels), it could still have been the same issue without the blame sitting on the pilots.

Re: US refuses to ground Boeing 737 Max

#270

Post by carlmr »

av_throwaway_19 wrote: post #68
stirlo wrote: post #15

It’s scary to think how complicit the FAA was in granting Boeing’s wish that this 30 year newer plane with substantially larger engines only required 2-3 hours of new training and said training was able to miss covering entire systems like MCAS. Now 350 people are dead, all the FAA can be thankful of is the dead are foreigners so it’s unlikely they’ll be held properly accountable.

It isn't just the FAA and Boeing. Where I work many of us have a "common type rating" between the A330 and A350 (-900 and -1000). While I commend Airbus for making them similar they are in no way common enough to justify the minuscule training course. Flying the A350 you get lots of brilliant features like brake-to-vacate, auto wing leveling during a crosswind landing (when you de-crab), differential flap setting in…

>Both have very different cockpit layouts. Even something simple like cockpit lighting is totally different. They have significantly different limitations, speeds and procedures for dealing with abnormal situations.

This sounds like a UX design problem. Things that are the same should be the same, things that are different should be different.

The most dangerous thing from a UX perspective is always the slightly different, especially in sequences. Everybody knows if their way to work and way to the store is partially the same it's easy to take the wrong fork when you want to go to the store.

So if the things are slightly different, it often makes sense to make the sequence different from the beginning. Otherwise people often make these common path mistakes.

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