Boeing 737 Max ?

[Broussard]

Also a good read, with more on the airworthiness of the 'plane itself...

https://spectrum.ieee.org/aerospace/...ware-developer

[PickleB]

Also a good read, with more on the airworthiness of the 'plane itself...

https://spectrum.ieee.org/aerospace/...ware-developer

Thanks for that. I was particularly struck by:

...As a lifetime member of the software development fraternity, I don’t know what toxic combination of inexperience, hubris, or lack of cultural understanding led to this mistake.

But I do know that it’s indicative of a much deeper problem. The people who wrote the code for the original MCAS system were obviously terribly far out of their league and did not know it. How can they can implement a software fix, much less give us any comfort that the rest of the flight management software is reliable?...

[PickleB]

Wiki...Return to Service:

International agreements allow for aviation regulatory agencies worldwide to certify an aircraft type based on the certification of the regulatory agency where the aircraft is built, and do not review those certifications in much detail. In this case the Boeing 737 MAX series is certified by the United States FAA, and a return to service locally and internationally requires updated certification by the FAA first. The European Aviation Safety Agency and Transport Canada announced they will do their own safety verifications before letting the 737 MAX fly again in their territories, and will no longer accept the United States FAA certification as is for this aircraft. Around March 20, 2019, Boeing announced it would make an additional safety feature on the plane model standard.

The FAA seeks consensus with other regulators to approve the return to service, to avoid suspicion of collusion with Boeing. On April 1, 2019, FAA said Boeing’s software fix for 737 MAX is still weeks away from delivery to FAA. This is an updated statement as Boeing previously told the public it is awaiting certification on the new software by the end of March.

On April 11, Boeing CEO Dennis Mullenburg said that the 737 MAX had completed 96 test flights with the new updated software. The software fix is expected to be delivered to the FAA "within the next two weeks."

For fleet scheduling and flight booking purposes, Southwest and American Airlines expect the 737 MAX to remain grounded (and flights canceled) through August 2019.

I wonder how the CAA will cope post-Brexit...should it happen.

[PickleB]

The denial continues...link:

Boeing's boss has refused to admit that a system introduced in its 737 Max 8 aircraft was flawed following two fatal plane crashes.

Appearing in front of investors and the media, Dennis Muilenburg maintained the system was only one factor in a chain of events that led to the disasters.

But new reports have raised fresh questions about the plane's safety.

It has emerged that whistleblowers connected to Boeing contacted the US airline regulator about the system...

[catch21]

Thanks for that!

It's tempting to say "they don't have any choice" but thinking a bit more about this they do. It's "legal" driving that statement. I should think "financial" have already crunched the figures and they know they're toast. The reputational damage is immense. This isn't VW fiddling a few tests. Buy a different make for a while and in a few years it will have gone away. This is way bigger than that.

Boeing have two strategies, come clean on this whole thing and hope people are sympathetic, or remain in denial. The odds aren't looking good for coming clean. This length of time after the accident to make a formal "denial" statement, in the face of everything else we now know, has made the company strategy very clear.

Sure there is a counter-argument that basic flying skils, attitude/power, could have saved the day but it still didn't in two separate cases. Automation-dependence is clearly a double-edged sword. Airbus seem to have transitioned into the world of automation successfully. Boeing's attempt at flight-envelope protection on a sub-optimal design has been less so. This shouldn't need a regulator to spot a fudged system. It was about money, about flying under the radar of additional training. It was a crackers implementation, what were Boeing thinking of?

The whistleblowing allegations will be very interesting to follow, what was said to who and what did they do about it.

Personally I think this will hit Boeing so hard financially that they won't survive in the present form.