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“I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

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Re: “I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

#41

Post by bambax »

noncoml wrote: post #10
ptidhomme wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wonder how we, humans, collectively build extraordinary monuments while we individually rest on stilts My take is that we used to have brilliant engineers in the time where computational ressources were scarce (60s, 70 , 80s...), and they thought out their design thoroughly starting with a fucking paper and pencil. Aerospace indutries still rely on the designs from these times. But now engineering seems to be : l…

Brilliant engineers are still there. We haven’t gotten stupider as a species in 30 years. It’s the economics that changed. As people say “They don’t build stuff like they used too anymore”. First we started going cheap on the materials. Now we are going cheap on the engineers too. Why pay a senior “brilliant” engineer $$$$ when a fresh out of college “average” engineer can write the “same piece of code” for $$

> “They don’t build stuff like they used too anymore”.

Okay maybe, but we have been saying this literally forever.

Re: “I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

#42

Post by gambiting »

m_mueller wrote: post #35
atemerev wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Russian, I hope that nuclear weapons still provide enough deterrence to avoid large-scale war between superpowers. However, this might not be the case, as said superpowers can just decide to avoid nuclear confrontation (because of immediate counterstrike) and still fight conventionally — just like chemical weapons weren’t used on large scale in WW2, compared to WW1.

What worries me is that the mechanics of MAD may be approaching their end. With increasing space technology, perimeter defense against ICBMs have become feasible (albeit still very expensive). Thinking this forward a couple of decades, I think that defense may become cheaper than offense, even with multiple warheads per ICBM. In a way that's good, as nuclear annihilation might be averted, on ther other hand it could…

I don't have such a feeling at all. It is my understanding(and please correct me if I'm wrong) that even with the best technology there is little to no defense to ICMBs. We have tech to stop some missiles, but with the sheer number of them in existence and the fact that every ICMB carries 12-16 warheads which split off early in descent stage, I think you can quite safely say that whatever target needs destroying it would be destroyed. Then there are weapons like the Russian System-6 torpedo which launches from a sub and detonates off shore to cause a gigantic tsunami destroying any coastal city(and if that wasn't bad enough, it can be salted with cobalt so that any area flooded by the tsunami is uninhabitable for at least few hundred years).

I don't know what sort of confidence level you'd need to have in your defence systems to even start thinking of actually using nuclear weapons against another superpower - the risk is just too great.

Re: “I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

#43

Post by Nokinside »

Neither safety critical software nor critical aircraft engineering relies on the personal quality of people involved. The safety is build into the process and the organizational structure. Usually involving multiple organizations that check each other's work.

What can happen is collapse of the process and regulatory capture.

Boeing is able to cut corners because FAA is cutting corners. FAA whistleblowers have demonstrated that FAA has culture that resulted in "malfeasance, bordering on corruption" https://www.latimes.com/travel/la-trw-airlines4apr04-story.h...

There is no sign that things are getting better. 737 MAX gained FAA certification on March 8, 2017. Meanwhile FAA has been running without administrator for two years. Trump tried to nominate his personal pilot, but when it failed he didn't nominate anyone. Dan Elwell is the acting administrator.

Re: “I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

#45

Post by IMTDb »

ilogik wrote: post #37
spectramax wrote: post #2

Btw, the new "fix" for the MCAS has just been announced and discussed by a 40-year experienced pilot [1]. Turns out that while we shouldn't be doing armchair analysis and assuming the worst of the engineering, management and executive team; the software fix released appears to be rather elementary and MCAS should have been designed with these safety checks in the first place. Why it wasn't is a huge concern and we wo…

> Original MCAS system used only 1 AOA sensor and switched back and forth between the two after every flight. Who the fuck thought that was a good idea??? Let's make it 10x more difficult to detect that there is a problem.

> Let's make it 10x more difficult to detect that there is a problem.

A problem no one can detect is a problem you don't need to fix ! /s

Re: “I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

#46

Post by gdy »

nostrademons wrote: post #8
curiousDog wrote: post #7

Unpopular opinion, but had this happened at a company that hired H1-Bs, people would’ve jumped on the incompetent immigrants band-wagon immediately. This here is a fine example of the classic American work ethic devolving into sheer laziness. FWIW, I saw this happen at another Military contractor (Northrop Grumman) too!

Sometimes I wonder what'll happen if the United States ever has to fight a war against an opponent whose industrial base is not 150 years behind it. Then again, I've heard Russian military equipment is in just as sorry a state. No idea what the Chinese military is like, but I'd imagine the real money is in selling to Americans rather than killing them. We're in this interesting place where it's entirely possible that…

"SpaceX has ballistic missiles with a CEP significantly smaller than a drone ship"

It goes quite slowly compared to a real ICBM and relies on GPS that will be jammed in a real war.

Re: “I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

#47

Post by cesarb »

chippy wrote: post #33

"I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period and I can absolutely guarantee this happened." was in response to this comment: "I would be very surprised if in a few years from today a bunch of engineers don't testify that ample of warning was given to management about this. " Reddit doesn't make it easy to find what they replied to.

> Reddit doesn't make it easy to find what they replied to.

The trick is to add ?context=3 to the end of the URL: https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/bdfqm4/the_real_rea... (or for the better "old" interface: https://old.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/bdfqm4/the_real_rea...)

Re: “I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

#48

Post by chrisseaton »

mgoia wrote: post #44

>This was inevitable. Inflammable means flammable? What a country!

'Evitable' means 'avoidable'. 'Inevitable' means 'not avoidable'. They mean the opposite, which is what you'd expect.

It's nothing like 'inflammable' and 'flammable', which mean the same thing. Those two have different roots which is why there is confusion.

Re: “I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

#49

Post by koenigdavidmj »

spectramax wrote: post #2

Btw, the new "fix" for the MCAS has just been announced and discussed by a 40-year experienced pilot [1]. Turns out that while we shouldn't be doing armchair analysis and assuming the worst of the engineering, management and executive team; the software fix released appears to be rather elementary and MCAS should have been designed with these safety checks in the first place. Why it wasn't is a huge concern and we wo…

I thought that the flight immediately before this one had MCAS trouble too. Were both sensors busted, or was that actually an even number of cycles previous to the crash, and only the previous day?

Re: “I worked at Boeing for about 1.5 years in the 2008-9 time period”

#50

Post by lawlessone »

lordnacho wrote: post #3

My view of aircraft engineering has certainly changed since the 737 stuff came out. You always get told software engineers are a bunch of cowboys compared to aircraft people, because they have to put everything through a bunch of rigourous tests. I asked a friend who trains commercial pilots about it, and to my surprise he told me the processes to get things certified are political and hand-wavy.

I know software is bad.

But using the same airframe from the 60's and just strapping bigger engines to it until you have to move the nacelle and alter flight characteristics seems like a cowboy move also.

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