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Canada grounds Boeing 737 Max 8

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Re: Canada grounds Boeing 737 Max 8

#281

Post by dragonwriter »

linuxftw wrote: post #279
dragonwriter wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How hard is it to write a law such as "If the same (public) commercial model plane crashes with fatalities more than once in an 18 month period, that model plane shall be grounded indefinitely until a root cause is established and mitigated" The problem is if you write a law like that, then even if the FAA still otherwise nominally retains its existing power, the mere fact of the "2 in 18-months" rule in statute wi…

> will have an effect of discouraging groundings with less than two crashes, or with 2 crashes more than 18-months apart. I don't see why this is necessarily the case. Clearly, there should be some established baseline to prevent regulatory capture by the industry. > Which is why Congress' role of executive oversight and accountability is as important as its role of writing legislation I think it's fair to say that o…

> I don't see why this is necessarily the case.

It is not necessarily the case in the sense of logical implication. Its just almost certainly the case, in the way in which laws effect implementing behavior in the real world.

Legislation which is mindful only of logical implication and not practical implication is a good way to screw things up.

> I think it's fair to say that object executive oversight has gone completely out the window in the last 20 years or so.

It is, and that's a problem that should be fixed. Asking Congress to micromanage by legislation rather than fixing the problems with executive oversight is not a solution, however.

Re: Canada grounds Boeing 737 Max 8

#282

Post by Cacti »

rootusrootus wrote: post #280
Cacti wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There has been one death in the past decade of US commercial flights. One in a decade of over 90 million flights.

But if you extend the time frame by a month and a day, it's 51. I otherwise agree.

Yes, because that was the exact crash that led to a number of improvements in air safety in the US...

Re: Canada grounds Boeing 737 Max 8

#284

Post by mikeash »

Twirrim wrote: post #234
mikeash wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Despite the name, UPS Airlines is a cargo company, not an airline. If you want to quibble over semantics, just pretend I specified “passenger airline” since that’s what I was talking about and that’s the relevant category.

Cargo companies come under the same regulations. You can't ignore them just because it's detrimental to your narrative.

The regulations are considerably less strict for cargo flights, and they’re notorious for being significantly more dangerous. I’m ignoring them because cargo safety is irrelevant, not because it’s inconvenient.

Re: Canada grounds Boeing 737 Max 8

#285

Post by nabla9 »

mcv wrote: post #42
ncr100 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US Government is sadly conflicted. FAA claiming there is "no evidence" of this aircraft having a systemic flaw. Meanwhile: Boeing brought $70B into Washington State's economy in one year. https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeingrsquos-economic-... Boeing is a major defense contractor, providing transportation, weapons, and other supplies to the US Military.

From what I understand about the issue so far, the systemic flaw is not in the aircraft, but in the training of the pilots. Or the lack thereof. Boeing wanted the 737 MAX to be considered just another 737 that didn't require any new training, but there are apparently significant changes compared to other 737 models that leave pilots feeling ill-prepared.

It is a systematic flaw.

Boeing announced that it had been working on a flight control software upgrade that includes updates to the MCAS flight control law, pilot displays, operation manuals and crew training. It's coming in few weeks and expected to be made mandatory by April by an FAA airworthiness directive.

Re: Canada grounds Boeing 737 Max 8

#286

Post by anigbrowl »

throwaway427 wrote: post #49
js2 wrote: post #20

Having read many commments on HN and elsewhere since the crash, I know I’m in the minority here when I say this but to me it seems like the US airlines and FAA are following their procedures, the same procedures that make the US airlines the safest in the world, while the rest of the world is, I don’t quite want to use the word panicking, but at least giving into pressure from people who aren’t aviation safety expert…

I agree and I don't think you deserve the downvotes. The FAA is an institution with a deep sense of safety first and independence from (and even dominion over) private industry. They are also a body of experts, with more collective knowledge than any other similar body of domain experts in world. If we believe in institutions of experts who study and make recommendations regarding complex systems, we owe it to the FA…

The FAA is great, and I'd agree it's probably better than any other individual agency in other countries. But better than all of them together? Maybe, maybe not.

To turn your concluding argument around, what is imprudent about grounding these planes until we have a clearer answer? It's going to cause some economic loss, but this seems like a much lower priority.

Re: Canada grounds Boeing 737 Max 8

#287

Post by nickjj »

isostatic wrote: post #242
nickjj wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would grounding it really destroy their reputation? Grounding it doesn't mean indefinitely. If anything, it's a huge positive if they grounded it until they knew for certain what's wrong because then it's a double win. Firstly, on the ground the plane has a 0% chance of killing anyone (unless someone decided to jump off the top of a parked plane and commit suicide, etc.), and secondly Boeing's reputation goes up beca…

Had Boeing grounded the fleet in the hours following the second crash (we're confident there's no problem however due to the highly unlikely coincidence we are proactively taking this step out of an abundance of cation), sure. When the truth comes out they'd be respected regardless of the outcome. Too late now though. If the truth comes out and it's not a Boeing problem, their reputation suffers for "what might have…

At first I didn't agree with your "too late now" remark but now that the US grounded them, you were spot on.

Now it feels more like a calculated reaction based on profits (ie. enough people cancelled MAX flights or asked for a flight change that grounding the plane is now a better decision financially).

In any case, it's a good result that they are grounded until everyone knows what happened during the crash and have an iron clad solution to prevent the same thing from happening in the future.

Re: Canada grounds Boeing 737 Max 8

#288

Post by magduf »

matz1 wrote: post #120
magduf wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, this sounds like a typical software developer mindset: "let's just use a workaround!" That's OK if you're using an office software product; it's not OK for an aircraft carrying hundreds of people where one small problem can kill them all (plus more people on the ground). The correct procedure is to ground the plane until the problem is fully understood, and use different planes.

If there are plenty of different plane and the cost of switching is low then yeah sure.

If you want to bet your life on something dangerous, go ahead, but don't ask others to do the same. Every major civil air authority is now grounding this plane, including the US.

Re: Canada grounds Boeing 737 Max 8

#289

Post by Baeocystin »

mises wrote: post #230
js2 wrote: post #20

Having read many commments on HN and elsewhere since the crash, I know I’m in the minority here when I say this but to me it seems like the US airlines and FAA are following their procedures, the same procedures that make the US airlines the safest in the world, while the rest of the world is, I don’t quite want to use the word panicking, but at least giving into pressure from people who aren’t aviation safety expert…

The thing people aren't looking at is the condition of the planes. Both crashes happened with planes of third-world nations, and might not have been held to the same rigorous standards. I'm glad America is trying to get the black box, because I'm not sure I'd trust the Ethiopian govt not to tamper with it just to protect their image (and their tourism industry).

Lion, maybe, (I don't know anything about them to say), but Ethiopian Air is a top-rated airliner.
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