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US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

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Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#111

Post by tw04 »

gottorf wrote: post #103
wanderingmind wrote: post #101

As an aside, For all those who talk about corruption and getting money out of politics I suggest reading Federalist 10 by Madison. Its a deep analysis of a need for a republican democracy. Any government that depends on human virtuousness will fail. The only way to have a sustainable government is to have strong checks and balances and putting multiple factions with different interests against one another.

> Any government that depends on human virtuousness will fail. The only way to have a sustainable government is to have strong checks and balances and putting multiple factions with different interests against one another. Absolutely! Any form of government that depends on an unbroken line of "good people" in power will fail, and fail much sooner than anybody thinks. Modern China has already reached the end of their…

> And government should only have as much power as you think the worst possible people in charge should have.

This immediately falls apart, by that logic we should literally have no government or society to speak of. "Only as much power as you think the worst possible person should have" would mean literally no power - there isn't a single decision in my life I would pass off to the worst person I could think of. What you're describing is anarchy.

You build checks and balances, but you cannot have a functioning government without the assumption that the people you put in charge will act in good faith, but also have a reliable means to remove them from power if they act in bad faith.

Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#112

Post by xenadu02 »

cromka wrote: post #105

Can someone explain why the focus is on FAA, while there's also EASA and others? Do they also allow Boeing to self-inspect and self-evaluate themselves like FAA does? Can FAA and Boeing be really the only ones to blame here? If Boeing was in bed with FAA that much and they were dropping the ball on safety, shouldn't EASA's own process take note of that and extra-scrutinize Boeing planes during certification for Europ…

I don't recall if it is just by handshake agreement or in an actual treaty but the country where the manufacturer of a plane operates is the one designated authority over that manufacturer.

FAA issues Airworthiness directives and sets rules Boeing has to follow. EASA largely defers to the FAA (not always but in almost everything).

Similarly the FAA follows EASA when it comes to issues with Airbus.

Both FAA and EASA requirements are roughly alined anyway so it doesn't make that much difference.

Boeing has been coasting on their engineer-led culture from the past. They're only allowed to self-certify on things that are not "safety critical" so having the FAA review that designation seems more useful.

FWIW when Boeing merged with McDonnel-Douglas the GE protégé crew took over. The decision to move headquarters was done deliberately so the machinists and engineers couldn't go complain to the bean counters in person.

Also think about Boeing setting up a factor in South Carolina and fighting so hard to prevent that factory from unionizing. They're focused on giving labor a smaller share of the pie... on some of the most expensive (and formerly profitable) things humans build, with a decade-long order book where every single unit they make is pre-sold years in advance. (Recent screwups have hurt them badly though).

Do you want an airplane built by an accountant-run company that cares about finding the cheapest most disposable workers to build the airplane? Whether it matters or whether the union sucks is irrelevant. The fact that Boeing management was so determined to screw the workers who assemble these planes says a lot and none of it is good.

Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#113

Post by cromka »

yyyfb wrote: post #107
cromka wrote: post #105

Can someone explain why the focus is on FAA, while there's also EASA and others? Do they also allow Boeing to self-inspect and self-evaluate themselves like FAA does? Can FAA and Boeing be really the only ones to blame here? If Boeing was in bed with FAA that much and they were dropping the ball on safety, shouldn't EASA's own process take note of that and extra-scrutinize Boeing planes during certification for Europ…

I don't know if that's at play, but the specific door configuration that Alaska 1282 had is apparently not that common in Europe. I'm sure EASA will take note though.

> I'm sure EASA will take note though.

There are no 737s operated in that configuration in Europe, so while EASA accepted FAA's grounding notice, it didn't really affect the EU.

But that's beyond the point. The point is those flawed quality controls that Boeing does on behalf of FAA could in theory affect other areas, not just the plug door. And so I wonder if EASA also allows Boeing to self-certify, or do they perform the checks themselves?

Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#114

Post by mikepurvis »

tw04 wrote: post #111
gottorf wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Any government that depends on human virtuousness will fail. The only way to have a sustainable government is to have strong checks and balances and putting multiple factions with different interests against one another. Absolutely! Any form of government that depends on an unbroken line of "good people" in power will fail, and fail much sooner than anybody thinks. Modern China has already reached the end of their…

> And government should only have as much power as you think the worst possible people in charge should have. This immediately falls apart, by that logic we should literally have no government or society to speak of. "Only as much power as you think the worst possible person should have" would mean literally no power - there isn't a single decision in my life I would pass off to the worst person I could think of. Wha…

I think that's the right take, with particular attention to overall transparency, since otherwise you have nothing— how do you hold someone accountable if you don't have the right to see what they're up to?

Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#115

Post by ryanisnan »

htrp wrote: post #102
ryanisnan wrote: post #96

I posted this because I was curious to learn that indeed, aviation companies were doing this. This type of self-evaluation is pretty common in software, though audits of compliance are also common. I wonder what sort of scenario might unfold if a company had a team of developers who's sole job it was to test other teams' software in a red-team fashion. I am all too familiar with QA organizations, and the problems in…

>I wonder what sort of scenario might unfold if a company had a team of developers who's sole job it was to test other teams' software in a red-team fashion. I am all too familiar with QA organizations, and the problems in that environment, and am all for developers conducting their own testing as a fundamental part of development, but what if we took it a step further? You get a lot of infighting between the develop…

Is the infighting you speak of politically motivated? Is this a QA vs. Dev mentality?

Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#116

Post by blibble »

wanderingmind wrote: post #101

As an aside, For all those who talk about corruption and getting money out of politics I suggest reading Federalist 10 by Madison. Its a deep analysis of a need for a republican democracy. Any government that depends on human virtuousness will fail. The only way to have a sustainable government is to have strong checks and balances and putting multiple factions with different interests against one another.

> Its a deep analysis of a need for a republican democracy.

> The only way to have a sustainable government is to have strong checks and balances

this is a very US centric view

constitutional monarchies seem to work as well, if not better by the various democracy/stability indicies

> Any government that depends on human virtuousness will fail.

the near term survival of the current US system certainly looks far from certain at present

Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#117

Post by cromka »

xenadu02 wrote: post #112
cromka wrote: post #105

Can someone explain why the focus is on FAA, while there's also EASA and others? Do they also allow Boeing to self-inspect and self-evaluate themselves like FAA does? Can FAA and Boeing be really the only ones to blame here? If Boeing was in bed with FAA that much and they were dropping the ball on safety, shouldn't EASA's own process take note of that and extra-scrutinize Boeing planes during certification for Europ…

I don't recall if it is just by handshake agreement or in an actual treaty but the country where the manufacturer of a plane operates is the one designated authority over that manufacturer. FAA issues Airworthiness directives and sets rules Boeing has to follow. EASA largely defers to the FAA (not always but in almost everything). Similarly the FAA follows EASA when it comes to issues with Airbus. Both FAA and EASA r…

> FAA issues Airworthiness directives and sets rules Boeing has to follow. EASA largely defers to the FAA (not always but in almost everything).

> Similarly the FAA follows EASA when it comes to issues with Airbus.

> Both FAA and EASA requirements are roughly alined anyway so it doesn't make that much difference.

Thanks. That then explains it. Although I have a feeling this mutual trust has its expiration date and I would be surprised if EASA didn't actually start raising concerns over the FAA's credibility.

Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#118

Post by junofan »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #109
game_the0ry wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Even with the two crashes air travel was still the safest form of travel those years (as it is every year, it has quite the buffer actually). This kind of fear mongering doesn't help anything. If airplanes were invented today people like you would have had them outlawed after the first accident.

[flagged]

Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#119

Post by gottorf »

tw04 wrote: post #111
gottorf wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Any government that depends on human virtuousness will fail. The only way to have a sustainable government is to have strong checks and balances and putting multiple factions with different interests against one another. Absolutely! Any form of government that depends on an unbroken line of "good people" in power will fail, and fail much sooner than anybody thinks. Modern China has already reached the end of their…

> And government should only have as much power as you think the worst possible people in charge should have. This immediately falls apart, by that logic we should literally have no government or society to speak of. "Only as much power as you think the worst possible person should have" would mean literally no power - there isn't a single decision in my life I would pass off to the worst person I could think of. Wha…

> but also have a reliable means to remove them from power if they act in bad faith.

That answers your concern -- that's a reduction in the power of government. The worst possible person being in charge is OK if that person cannot unilaterally make things worse for everyone. I don't think it necessarily describes anarchy, though I do take your point.

As for people acting in good faith, well, POSIWID[0] is a thing; ideally the system should be designed such that it shouldn't matter whether any individual within the system is acting in good faith or not, because the incentive structures set up therein will lead to positive outcomes. Besides, for any politically divisive topic, someone will always think you're acting in bad faith, anyway.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_wha...

Re: US regulator considers stripping Boeing's right to self-inspect planes

#120

Post by emarsden »

brink wrote: post #6

What other industry is allowed to inspect itself? It completely ruins the point of an inspection. It's like being the judge and jury in your own trial. I'm amazed this is a thing in the first place.

There are several good reasons for allowing it. One is that it's difficult for a public inspectorate/regulator to maintain the necessary levels of expertise to assess such complex systems (and increasingly so with technological progress). Furthermore, people working inside the industry have much better access to information about the risks than an outside inspector has.

A second reason is simply costs to the public. In 2019, the interim FAA director Dan Elwell testified to the US Senate after the 737 Max disasters that bringing all delegated oversight back into the FAA would require 10000 extra staff and USD 1.8B in costs. There are fairness/democratic arguments to having the costs borne by the industry (and thus indirectly by the privileged portion of the taxpayers who consume air traffic) rather than by all taxpayers.

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