Live data from Hacker News

Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

telegraph.co.uk

11–20 of 84 posts

Re: Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

#11
post #8

These articles are getting a little tiresome. Private enterprise is about competition and cost reduction. That’s what drives improvement, innovation, and efficiency, and it’s what differentiates private enterprise from government spending, which is about justifying why things need to be so expensive. Yes, Boeing was too aggressive about reducing cost to compete with Airbus and they need some major reform because hund…

>they need some major reform because hundreds of people are dead

>allows you today fly across the country in perfect safety

Perfect seems to be a poor choice of words here.

Re: Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

#12
post #2

Have airlines cancelled orders of the 737 Max? If yes the will they be canceling orders of this one too?

> Have airlines cancelled orders of the 737 Max?

Yes. (Though IAG did agree a letter of intent—not an actual order, though—with Boeing for 200 aircraft. It was rumoured this was the biggest discount seen in the aviation world since Ryanair's large post-9/11 order.)

> If yes the will they be canceling orders of this one too?

Probably not? The 777X will be looked at incredibly closely prior to certification, and doesn't have the design oddities of the 737 MAX, so it probably is much lower risk, even with the cultural problems.

Re: Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

#13
post #8

These articles are getting a little tiresome. Private enterprise is about competition and cost reduction. That’s what drives improvement, innovation, and efficiency, and it’s what differentiates private enterprise from government spending, which is about justifying why things need to be so expensive. Yes, Boeing was too aggressive about reducing cost to compete with Airbus and they need some major reform because hund…

You probably are a developer, but engineering in life critical fields can't be reduced to cost efficiency.

I’m a developer and a pilot. I understand that cost is not the only factor. My frustration is, the attitude in the media today is to report negatively on every single instance they can find of Boeing trying to reduce costs as if that is a sin in itself, when it’s actually the most fundamental driver of improvement in the entire economy!

Re: Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

#14

I can’t read the whole article because of the paywall. But from the lead in it doesn’t look like it really is ‘the same issues’ as in problems with a lack of redundant sensor and overly aggressive correction due to engines that are too big. Anyone whose read the whole thing care to correct me?

The sensors and correction are a symptom of the issue at Boeing, which is an aggressive pursuit of profit over safety.

Re: Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

#15
post #8

These articles are getting a little tiresome. Private enterprise is about competition and cost reduction. That’s what drives improvement, innovation, and efficiency, and it’s what differentiates private enterprise from government spending, which is about justifying why things need to be so expensive. Yes, Boeing was too aggressive about reducing cost to compete with Airbus and they need some major reform because hund…

It wasn’t perfectly reasonable to have a non redundant sensor that could have life threatening consequences if it failed.... and to also make the sensor failure alarm optional equipment doesn’t sound very reasonable to me either. It’s not about using software to compensate for the loss of aerodynamics... it’s about cheating the process so they wouldn’t have to put the design through a detailed review that could have eliminated this whole debacle in the first place.

Re: Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

#16
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still doesn’t fill me with reassurance about the safety of flying on one of these.

Cost cutting and aggressive timelines will always happen, and in a company as large as Boeing, someone will have made a comment like this about pretty much anything, so I have a really hard time telling if this is telling data or hindsight bias.

These are qualified engineers who treat their job seriously. It's not hindsight bias, they are proactively warning about the same pipeline issues.

Re: Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

#17

Please, anyone let this be a lesson: you can destroy a brand that took decades to build in a matter of months.

The decision to launch a product and the immediate after process take a few months, but the entire product development process took years likely.

Also....it makes me uncomfortable when news stations report "internal email says X". Like...a) if it's not a news outlet that's tech knowledgeable that's always scary b) let's say 5000 employees worked on this. 20x emails per day. 5 year period (10000 days). That is a lot of emails that went into discovery for the attorneys or forensic guys to parse. Theres probably a lot of knowledge in there but humans are smart about that they selectively email (I knew someone that interned in the Obama White House and a large email flow was "documenting for posterity what they wanted to be in the record" through emails to no one in particular, was what she said). The 777 could be messed up, but "staff emails" is such an uncomfortable source. Did the likely top tier law firm really leak email contents?

Re: Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

#18
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You probably are a developer, but engineering in life critical fields can't be reduced to cost efficiency.

I’m a developer and a pilot. I understand that cost is not the only factor. My frustration is, the attitude in the media today is to report negatively on every single instance they can find of Boeing trying to reduce costs as if that is a sin in itself, when it’s actually the most fundamental driver of improvement in the entire economy!

I sympathize with your view that the media tends to lump things together in a gross and unfair way. However we happen to be talking about a company with a culture that apparently sees nothing wrong with openly trashing the faa’s certification process while another division spends $22B of taxpayer money on an unflyable space launch system. One kind of wonders if they care about the American public at all.

Re: Staff emails claim Boeing 777X ‘shares Max problem’

#20
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You probably are a developer, but engineering in life critical fields can't be reduced to cost efficiency.

I’m a developer and a pilot. I understand that cost is not the only factor. My frustration is, the attitude in the media today is to report negatively on every single instance they can find of Boeing trying to reduce costs as if that is a sin in itself, when it’s actually the most fundamental driver of improvement in the entire economy!

It's hard emotionally. Most of us buy close to the cheapest flight right? Almost exclusively? Like it's a commodity service in a capital intensive industry which cyclical patterns of bankruptcy. I knew a guy at BCG/McKinsey/Bain who only did airline consulting and it seems like a particular tough industry even if fuel costs didnt move all over the place.

At the same time obviously no one wants to cut a corner and cause danger.

Boeing is probably scared of Airbus and vice versa.

Its probably just a challenging environment.

Post reply on HN