Smoke in the cabin of two 737 MAX caused by Load Reduction Device system [video] • Hacker News Board

Re: Smoke in the cabin of two 737 MAX caused by Load Reduction Device system [video]

#81

Post by p_l » Wed, Feb 12, 2025, 8:59 PM UTC

MBCook wrote: post #30

apical_dendrite wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I've read, CFM and Boeing committed back in December to making the software fix that's suggested in the video. https://aerospaceglobalnews.com/news/bird-strike-incident-se... Why FAA and EASA didn't require any procedure changes in the interim to prevent the issue is a very good question.

Can they force an install? Or will it be a choice? I like Mentor Pilot and Air Disasters, so I know I’ve heard of a few where the problem that caused an accident was already known and a fix was available but the airline just chose not to do it because they had that option. Or it was scheduled but hadn’t been performed yet because it wasn’t thought to be that critical. Having the FAA mandate the fix seems like it woul…

Sometimes the vendor will provide an optional fix in a safety information bulletin, sometimes they will be mandatory (Sometimes the optional ones become mandatory [1]).

They are coordinated with applicable certification bodies (civil aviation authorities) and distributed as airworthiness directives that can, in fact, force a specific action to be taken.

[1] (writing from memory unfortunately) an airflow modification for 737 NG (iirc, could be older 737, pre-MAX definitely) avionics bay was "optional", as in mandatory only for aircraft flying in hot enough regions. After a near miss in Poland when steadily overheating avionics essentially slowly lobotomized a plane after takeoff. Turned out europe got hot enough for it.

After that incident, Boeing issued a change in safety information bulletin that the modification was now mandatory.

Re: Smoke in the cabin of two 737 MAX caused by Load Reduction Device system [video]

#82

Post by jiggawatts » Thu, Feb 13, 2025, 12:12 AM UTC

MBCook wrote: post #70

jiggawatts wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AFAIK, no. I read through the 787 Dreamliner manual for setting up the software for patch distribution to the planes, and there are checks and overrides at every step. The whole thing is physically controlled by the owning airline or maybe the leasing company, but not Boeing.

That sounds smart. I wasn’t thinking a “we’re pushing an update too bad” kind of thing but more a “hey you have to do this to be allowed to fly, your choice” with the weight of law behind it.

That guide book was genuinely amazing, it was easily the best-written technical document of any kind that I had read.

The security is dialed up to 11 as well. It explicitly calls out the following scenario:

1) The plane is leased. 2) the maintenance is outsourced. 3) The plane at an airport in an "unfriendly" country. 4) The plane is not allowed to take off until it is patched due to an emergency directive.

That scenario is handled, securely!

There is encryption between the plane and the airport WiFi.

The maintenance crew can also plug in to an Ethernet port near the front landing gear.

There is a VPN back to the patch server managed by the airline.

The VPN host certificate is explicitly whitelisted in the plane.

The plane won't accept a patch unless it has been digitally signed by Boeing, the FAA, the Airline, and potentially the manufacturer and the local equivalent of the FAA!)

The pilot has to enter a 4-digit pin code in the plane.

Most of the associated wiring is only physically connected if there is weight on the front landing gear. You can't "hack" a plane in-flight and patch it with malware, the required cabling isn't connected.

Re: Smoke in the cabin of two 737 MAX caused by Load Reduction Device system [video]

#83

Post by cduzz » Thu, Feb 13, 2025, 12:36 AM UTC

lukevp wrote: post #38

cduzz wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not cooked -- poisoned. As far as I understand, the people in the cabin or the cockpit will breath the oil that's now been aerosolized -- in the cockpit it's really hazardous because it's such a small air volume. The oil's full of all kinds of things you wouldn't ever want to breathe in, and in the cockpit it's enough to poison you really fast.

Yeah but there’s 2 people in there, and 180 people in the rest of the plane. Isn’t the volume of air relative to the amount of people breathing it relevant as well?

I'm certainly worried about the health of those people in the bigger part of the airplane.

If the people in the cockpit are incapacitated, though, it's a problem for everyone on the plane. The oil has nasty stuff that kills the pilots, but it's also hard to see through.

Basically, at the very very least, let's not dump the oil into the cockpit. Ideally let's not dump the oil into the passenger compartment either, but sheesh, let's not kill or blind the pilots as table stakes..

Re: Smoke in the cabin of two 737 MAX caused by Load Reduction Device system [video]

#84

Post by himinlomax » Thu, Feb 13, 2025, 8:58 AM UTC

db48x wrote: post #58

K0balt wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, it seems that the internal FAA recommendations were not allowed to make their way into any kind of airworthiness directive. The recommendations include very basic procedure changes that mitigate the near term risks without any significant impact to operation, as well as recommendations for what probably amounts to a software change and upgrades to some of the pilot oxygen masks to effect a permanent fi…

> […] stops short of recommending some very, very simple steps in aircraft configuration prior to takeoff that would completely mitigate the issue […] Well, the configuration changes during takeoff mitigate the issue if it happens during takeoff. If it happens at any other time then they don’t do anything to help. > I can see no reason to drag feet on this recommendation […] I can. Perhaps the FAA believes that it is…

> Keep in mind that for most aircraft the airline can pick and choose between different engines.

737 Max can only have CFM Leap engines.

A320 can have either Leap or PW GTF.