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Are There Problems with the Boeing 737Max? 2nd Deadly Crash Raises New Questions

49 points by mykowebhn 8y ago

rurban 8y ago
Relevant anti-stall SW problem on initial ascent, which they explain as documentation problem: "In that case, investigations by the Indonesian and American aviation authorities determined that the Lion Air plane’s abrupt nose dive might have been caused by updated Boeing software that was meant to prevent a stall but that can send the plane into a fatal descent if the altitude and angle information being fed into the computer system is incorrect. The change in the flight control system, which can override manual motions in the Max model, was not explained to pilots, according to some pilots’ unions."
pdx_flyer 8y ago
I know reporters will say they don't want to us to draw conclusions but honestly, I'll be avoiding the 737Max until this is figured out.
mach5 8y ago
0.6% of 737 MAX aircraft delivered have been lost in unsurvivable accidents... similar numbers to orbital rockets. yikes.
- hn_throwaway_99 8y ago
  That analogy is bad statistics, and I think we should call out those bad statistics, especially on HN.
- aphextron 8y ago
  >0.6% of 737 MAX aircraft delivered have been lost in unsurvivable accidents... similar numbers to orbital rockets. yikes. This is what immediately struck me as well. Boeing has delivered 354 aircraft, 2 of which have gone down with all on board in the last 12 months. It's looking like they have a Comet on their hands.
- extropy 8y ago
  Apples to oranges. Assuming they where 1 year in service and doing 1 flight per day, it's more like 0.002% accidents to flights.
- gus_massa 8y ago
  It's an unfair calculation. Most orbital rocket are used only once. Another unfair calculation: 40% of the Space Shuttle have been lost in unsurvivable accidents. It's better to compare the number of accident divided by the number of flight. For the Space Shuttle, it's 2/135 = 1.4% of the flights. For the manned Soyuz, it's 2/165 = 1.2% of the flight (but both are in very old models).
pella 8y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19353059 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19353059
SirLuxuryYacht 8y ago
A very big tech company releases software updates that contain bugs for their devices with fruit on them. One would think that they could produce software without major problems, but it happens. One would also think that a very big aerospace company could produce products without significant bugs, but it seems that it unfortunately happens too. Talk about a fatal error. Thinking about a solution to make their QC more robust brings me back to an article from 11 days ago on fuzzing: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19265377 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19265377
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- foobarbazetc 8y ago
  I think Airbus does a lot of formal proving / verification of their flight software. There was a great article about it which I can’t find anymore, but Google is full of academic papers on it.

49 points by mykowebhn 8y ago

Relevant anti-stall SW problem on initial ascent, which they explain as documentation problem: "In that case, investigations by the Indonesian and American aviation authorities determined that the Lion Air plane’s abrupt nose dive might have been caused by updated Boeing software that was meant to prevent a stall but that can send the plane into a fatal descent if the altitude and angle information being fed into the computer system is incorrect. The change in the flight control system, which can override manual motions in the Max model, was not explained to pilots, according to some pilots’ unions."

pdx_flyer 8y ago

I know reporters will say they don't want to us to draw conclusions but honestly, I'll be avoiding the 737Max until this is figured out.

mach5 8y ago

0.6% of 737 MAX aircraft delivered have been lost in unsurvivable accidents... similar numbers to orbital rockets. yikes.

hn_throwaway_99 8y ago
That analogy is bad statistics, and I think we should call out those bad statistics, especially on HN.
aphextron 8y ago
>0.6% of 737 MAX aircraft delivered have been lost in unsurvivable accidents... similar numbers to orbital rockets. yikes. This is what immediately struck me as well. Boeing has delivered 354 aircraft, 2 of which have gone down with all on board in the last 12 months. It's looking like they have a Comet on their hands.
extropy 8y ago
Apples to oranges. Assuming they where 1 year in service and doing 1 flight per day, it's more like 0.002% accidents to flights.
gus_massa 8y ago
It's an unfair calculation. Most orbital rocket are used only once. Another unfair calculation: 40% of the Space Shuttle have been lost in unsurvivable accidents. It's better to compare the number of accident divided by the number of flight. For the Space Shuttle, it's 2/135 = 1.4% of the flights. For the manned Soyuz, it's 2/165 = 1.2% of the flight (but both are in very old models).

pella 8y ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19353059 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19353059

SirLuxuryYacht 8y ago

A very big tech company releases software updates that contain bugs for their devices with fruit on them. One would think that they could produce software without major problems, but it happens. One would also think that a very big aerospace company could produce products without significant bugs, but it seems that it unfortunately happens too. Talk about a fatal error. Thinking about a solution to make their QC more robust brings me back to an article from 11 days ago on fuzzing: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19265377 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19265377

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
foobarbazetc 8y ago
I think Airbus does a lot of formal proving / verification of their flight software. There was a great article about it which I can’t find anymore, but Google is full of academic papers on it.