FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes • Hacker News Board

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#331

Post by MaxBarraclough » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 6:03 AM UTC

LMYahooTFY wrote: post #287

hwestiii wrote: post #234

This all points up the glaring conflicts of interest in the corporate business environment. Most of us think that Boeing is the business of building airplanes, but as a publicly traded company, its real business is making money for its shareholders, and aerospace is just a vehicle toward that end. The Boeing CEO's steadfast refusal to take responsibility for these two crashes are nothing more than CYA designed to lim…

This is only the beginning of a question. It's not obvious how the responsibility for those deaths should be allocated. What's the tolerance threshold for airline fatalities?

> What's the tolerance threshold for airline fatalities?

Meaning what?

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#332

Post by MaxBarraclough » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 6:08 AM UTC

ddalex wrote: post #251

ordu wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mostly it doesn't happen. Shareholders might want to take risks. This time it gone bad. Next time it probably wouldn't.

> it probably wouldn't if you cut corners on engineering to reduce costs and nothing bad happens, that good engineering actually

Not really.

Suppose Bob fires a gun into a crowded area and happens not to hit anyone. I didn't hurt anyone! It's my right as a consequentialist!"

Bob still goes to prison.

Beyond that, engineering is about using a principled approach, by definition. Throwing something together ad-hoc and finding that it happens to work, is not what is meant by 'engineering'.

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#333

Post by ddalex » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 6:25 AM UTC

MaxBarraclough wrote: post #332

ddalex wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it probably wouldn't if you cut corners on engineering to reduce costs and nothing bad happens, that good engineering actually

Not really. Suppose Bob fires a gun into a crowded area and happens not to hit anyone. I didn't hurt anyone! It's my right as a consequentialist!" Bob still goes to prison. Beyond that, engineering is about using a principled approach, by definition. Throwing something together ad-hoc and finding that it happens to work, is not what is meant by 'engineering'.

I think your analogy misses the point that a core scope of engineering is reducing cost. Firing a weapon in a crowded area is not a scope of anybody, bar terrorists. If Bob would be a humanitarian terrorist, him firing the gun in a crowded area and not hitting anyone would be a great outcome for him, even if he didn't hit anybody just by chance.

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#334

Post by BorRagnarok » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 7:50 AM UTC

moftz wrote: post #228

BorRagnarok wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still don't trust the FAA at all. They've been sourcing out their own work to Boeing since the 787 Dreamliner [0]. That's seven years ago. I don't think this will make them change their practices. The 787 fiasco certainly didn't. Personally I'd be happiest if the world just scrapped all the Max-es. Just scrap 'em, let Boeing go out of business, it's what they deserve now, they shouldn't exist anymore as a company.…

It's not footage but that angle of attack is absolutely nuts. I don't think my brain would have been able to process that kind of image out my window if I was a passenger on that plane. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIunpQQpzs0

Thanks. That's genuinely scary.

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#335

Post by BorRagnarok » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 7:55 AM UTC

lysp wrote: post #329

BorRagnarok wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still don't trust the FAA at all. They've been sourcing out their own work to Boeing since the 787 Dreamliner [0]. That's seven years ago. I don't think this will make them change their practices. The 787 fiasco certainly didn't. Personally I'd be happiest if the world just scrapped all the Max-es. Just scrap 'em, let Boeing go out of business, it's what they deserve now, they shouldn't exist anymore as a company.…

> I still don't trust the FAA at all. They've been sourcing out their own work to Boeing since the 787 Dreamliner I don't think the main issue is outsourcing the engineering work out. The bigger thing is they were outsourcing their management and reporting to Boeing as well. That meant rather than independent overview, Boeing managers were able to pressure shortcuts and cost cutting and could threaten engineers jobs…

The biggest problem is not Boeing sourcing out its work, it's the FAA sourcing out its design certification work to Boeing. Boeing now designs the planes, and certifies them for safe design. That's what's nuts. In the documentary I posted above that problem was already identified, and that was seven years ago. Nothing has changed, Boeing still certifies its own planes and the FAA just signs off on them.

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#336

Post by BorRagnarok » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 8:22 AM UTC

navigatesol wrote: post #256

BorRagnarok wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> FAA and Boeing (and Airbus as well) are all going to learn a lot from this process which will make air travel safer in the future Yeah, right. Until they start cutting corners again for economic reasons. There's absolutely no change in any of those organizations driven by this incident or by an increase in standards or by safety, there are no new regulations, it's all a dog and pony show driven by money and saving…

> There's absolutely no change in any of those organizations driven by this incident or by an increase in standards or by safety, there are no new regulations How fast do you think this stuff can happen? > And that's a great argument for just letting the next horrible accident happen in a few years. The next horrible accident is going to happen in a few years, sorry to tell you. > Accidents will stay a calculated ris…

> How fast do you think this stuff can happen?

Above I posted a seven year old documentary about the 787 Dreamliner, and there were the same problems of Boeing doing the FAA's work. So to answer your question: I don't really know, but it seems to be decades at least before anything changes, if at all. And that's really appalling.

>I'm going to assume you're no engineer.

I am, actually.

As an engineer you can calculate a risk like: this part under this type of load will fail at x, and then design so that x is never reached (or in a million years or so) to make a design safe.

A manager can calculate risk like: if we sell 5k planes, and we can make them $1000 cheaper by using a part that will increase the likelihood of a crash by only 2%, since the chance of a crash is already very very low, we might as well use the inferior part and make $5m extra. That way I can buy that third mansion I want.

Both are calculating risk. The engineer calculates for safety, the manager for his stock options. Which do you think is better?

My point is, the goal should always be complete safety. Even though engineers know that that is impossible, and even though lots of managers don't care at all about safety. We should still strive for it. Total flight safety should be the goal, not a byproduct of good engineering.

That's why we have the FAA in the first place, because we don't trust those managers at Boeing to make the right decisions, because experience learned us we shouldn't.

We trusted on the FAA and Boeing to hold that goal of passenger safety to the highest standards, but they betrayed that trust completely by letting Boeing do the FAA's work! Isn't that completely bonkers? Perhaps we just should scrap the FAA as well and let the Europeans certify all planes. I don't know. But right now there's nothing but ass-saving going on, and that doesn't restore trust in either of those organizations.

Lot's of people should be going to jail for this, but they wont, because they're rich and can buy their way out. Everybody knows this. That's the way the United States works. Justice is only for the rich and powerful. That's how Boeing can kill 300+ people and get away with it. As an engineer, this worries me greatly.

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#337

Post by BorRagnarok » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 8:28 AM UTC

laythea wrote: post #267

jussij wrote: post #41

The FAA suffered a major loss of credibility in their handling of the first round of testing/accreditation of the MAX. The FAA can't afford another stuff up this second time around and as such I suspect they will be checking every aspect of the plane in very fine detail. That could spell more trouble for Boeing.

I wonder what would be unearthed should they also choose to look at Boeing's other planes in such similar scrutiny.

Me too. I know the 787 is choke full of design and construction errors as well, but am curious about the others. We'll have to wait on any model to start falling out of the sky regularly to get an answer though. Because as long as it doesn't fail they're sure as hell not going to check. That's how you design planes at Boeing see? You half ass a plane, and then let the public beta test it.

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#338

Post by BorRagnarok » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 8:30 AM UTC

sixothree wrote: post #253

jussij wrote: post #41

The FAA suffered a major loss of credibility in their handling of the first round of testing/accreditation of the MAX. The FAA can't afford another stuff up this second time around and as such I suspect they will be checking every aspect of the plane in very fine detail. That could spell more trouble for Boeing.

> they will be checking every aspect of the plane in very fine detail. But is that really what is going on here? Are they equipped to do so any longer?

They don't even have the manpower for that. So that's the PR dept probably.

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#339

Post by BorRagnarok » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 8:33 AM UTC

retSava wrote: post #204

kahirsch wrote: post #86

When the Boeing CEO had his press conference in April, he said "we've confirmed that the MCAS system as originally designed did meet our design and safety analysis criteria and our certification criteria."[1] I yelled at the screen "you know that means the criteria are flawed , right? If the procedures didn't catch this mistake, that means there are other mistakes that weren't caught!" A flabbergasted reporter then a…

Admitting culpability more or less admits financial responsibility as well. If Boeing would say "we're at fault", people would sue them (more than now) and have greater chance at winning those lawsuits, since Boeing already admitted to being at fault. I can imagine Boeing, and the Boeing CEO, is trying very, very hard at walking a fine line of not admitting being at fault, but also saying that they are "taking respon…

Can you imagine killing 300+ people and then having to talk in such a way to accomplish that down the line the least amount of money will go to the families of the victims? This man has really has no soul.

Re: FAA Finds New Risk on 737 Max, Orders Boeing to Make Changes

#340

Post by BorRagnarok » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 8:37 AM UTC

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #314

rsynnott wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My instinct is that you're probably correct, and most planes are probably riddled with similar problems and would look bad if they came under the same scrutiny as the 737 Max is currently under. 0.5% of all 737 MAXes which exist have killed everyone on board. No other mass market production airliner in recent history has that sort of record, AFAIK.

Wikipedia says 393 have been produced, so more like 0.25%.

2 out of 393 is roughly 0.5%