5 ms·

Is anyone else surprised that there have been no whistleblower leaks wrt the 737 Max and MCAS? Are we left to conclude that there really weren’t any engineers

Is anyone else surprised that there have been no whistleblower leaks wrt the 737 Max and MCAS? Are we left to conclude that there really weren’t any engineers who thought putting in a system like MCAS, giving it authority to override the pilots, making it dependent on a single AOA sensor, not testing the system under a sensor failure, and not telling pilots or carriers about said system was a really bad idea. Yet we’re 6+ months out, and we’ve heard nothing other than the AOA disagree light issue.

djhaskin987 7y ago
The article refers to Boeing and the whistleblowers from that company involved in disclosing problems with the 738 MAX, so apparently there were leaks.
e40 7y ago
It's unclear. There was a podcast I listened to recently that featured several Boeing whistleblowers, but they focused on the 787 not the 737. Just because we haven't heard about them doesn't mean they don't exist. Whistleblowers don't necessarily contact the media, they might just be contacting the FAA. And, the FAA, in the case of the previously mentioned 787 whistleblowers, did not take any real action against Boeing. I can try and dig up the podcast if anyone is interested.
rectang 7y ago
With two planes down and hundreds of people dead, all the ugly stuff is coming out now, regardless. It's not necessary for a whistleblower to step out and sacrifice their life to bring us that information. And I'm skeptical whether there was ever enough certainty with regards to the deadliness of MCAS which could have justified a whistleblower level of personal sacrifice. It's easy for me to believe that people thought it would be good enough, or that at least that no one felt sure that it would fail. We should treat whistleblowers better, but our safety and regulatory regimes should be designed to function without them.
- bumby 7y ago
  I think you hit a good point. I'm fairly confident that most engineers/people will make the call if it's a clear-cut case of "this will inevitably lead to catastrophe" But in the real-world, everything is shrouded in a level of uncertainty. For most bad scenarios, people are really good at rationalizing why it's not going to happen. Unfortunately, it seems the level of rationalization is directly proportional to their incentives against admitting that bad outcome is a real possibility.
- specialist 7y ago
  "...our safety and regulatory regimes should be designed to function without them" As I understand it, subverting the oversight regimes, allowing Boeing to sign off on their own work, is a big part of this story. I was a SQA Manager for a while. Every writer needs an editor. It blows my mind that we still believe people can catch their own mistakes. Source: My neighbor and bestie was a Boeing lifer, mostly working in QC/QA. I get to hear all about this stuff.
boomlinde 7y ago
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/boeing-737-max-8-at-least-4-potential-whistleblower-calls-made-to-faa-about-jetliner/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/boeing-737-max-8-at-least-4-pot...
Roark66 7y ago
I am surprised, but at the same time I'm aware that unfortunately there is an endemic lack of taking responsibility in many modern engineering professions. Software engineering being one of them. I often see by myself and read about other cases elsewhere of examples of badly designed and written software being put in place due to short shortsightedly perceived financial goals of doing so. I bet that every software engineer encountered such software in their career. Were the engineers that created it incompetent? Perhaps, but more likely is that they were put under pressure to deliver such flawed solutions, and people who said no were replaced with those that said yes no matter what. I recently watched a documentary about death penalty and how states couldn't get doctors to design the lethal injection because none would agree to work on it. I envy that doctors can have such integrity, but as a group we engineers have very little when money is involved.
- ryandrake 7y ago
  > Perhaps, but more likely is that they were put under pressure to deliver such flawed solutions, and people who said no were replaced with those that said yes no matter what. Early in my career I asked to not work on a project on ethical grounds, and my manager said “fine, Ted is fine with doing it, so I’ll assign you to a different project!” Years later I actually quit a job partially over objection to some less than ethical uses of the technology, and the boss never even broke a sweat. There were lines of developers out the door willing to replace me. Software engineering talent is effectively unlimited because we have no professional organization that caps supply, like doctors have. This leads to all kinds of races-to-the-bottom.
  - AstralStorm 7y ago
    Until you get to the top of the accredited safety critical software developers. The cream of the crop. Note there is a supply limiter in the form of accreditation and another of typically requiring years of experience too.
- bsder 7y ago
  > I am surprised, but at the same time I'm aware that unfortunately there is an endemic lack of taking responsibility in many modern engineering professions. Software engineering being one of them. There is no such thing as "Software Engineer". You can't get a Professional Engineering license for it, nor can you be sued for not adhering to standards. The National Society for Professional Engineers (NSPE) was screaming for years that software people should not be allowed to call themselves engineers. They lost that battle, and here we are with your comment. And the all the resulting issues that the NSPE predicted. > I recently watched a documentary about death penalty and how states couldn't get doctors to design the lethal injection because none would agree to work on it. I envy that doctors can have such integrity, but as a group we engineers have very little when money is involved. This has nothing to do with integrity and everything to do with the fact that you could lose your medical license. You would have to offer a doctor enough money to cover the rest of their career, and states are notoriously cheap.
Kiro 7y ago
From the article you're replying to: "Indeed, in the aftermath of recent Boeing 737 MAX crashes, the media routinely and positively refers to disclosures by “Boeing whistleblowers.”"
afterburner 7y ago
The article states: > Indeed, in the aftermath of recent Boeing 737 MAX crashes, the media routinely and positively refers to disclosures by “Boeing whistleblowers.” So, I guess there are some whistleblowers?
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
manfredo 7y ago
Was there any actual malicious or reckless intent behind these events? From what I gathered, there were a whole chain of bad decisions: * Moving the engines higher and forward and keeping the same aircraft designation. * Patching this design change over with software to push forward on the yoke at high AOA. * Failing to account for AOA sensor failure. * A bad trim-resetting logic that let MCAS exert almost total authority over the elevators. * Poor pilot training on these new features All these things came together to make planes fall out of the sky, I'm not sure if there was any one individual that had the whole picture in their mind.

djhaskin987 7y ago

The article refers to Boeing and the whistleblowers from that company involved in disclosing problems with the 738 MAX, so apparently there were leaks.

e40 7y ago

It's unclear. There was a podcast I listened to recently that featured several Boeing whistleblowers, but they focused on the 787 not the 737. Just because we haven't heard about them doesn't mean they don't exist. Whistleblowers don't necessarily contact the media, they might just be contacting the FAA. And, the FAA, in the case of the previously mentioned 787 whistleblowers, did not take any real action against Boeing. I can try and dig up the podcast if anyone is interested.

rectang 7y ago

With two planes down and hundreds of people dead, all the ugly stuff is coming out now, regardless. It's not necessary for a whistleblower to step out and sacrifice their life to bring us that information. And I'm skeptical whether there was ever enough certainty with regards to the deadliness of MCAS which could have justified a whistleblower level of personal sacrifice. It's easy for me to believe that people thought it would be good enough, or that at least that no one felt sure that it would fail. We should treat whistleblowers better, but our safety and regulatory regimes should be designed to function without them.

bumby 7y ago
I think you hit a good point. I'm fairly confident that most engineers/people will make the call if it's a clear-cut case of "this will inevitably lead to catastrophe" But in the real-world, everything is shrouded in a level of uncertainty. For most bad scenarios, people are really good at rationalizing why it's not going to happen. Unfortunately, it seems the level of rationalization is directly proportional to their incentives against admitting that bad outcome is a real possibility.
specialist 7y ago
"...our safety and regulatory regimes should be designed to function without them" As I understand it, subverting the oversight regimes, allowing Boeing to sign off on their own work, is a big part of this story. I was a SQA Manager for a while. Every writer needs an editor. It blows my mind that we still believe people can catch their own mistakes. Source: My neighbor and bestie was a Boeing lifer, mostly working in QC/QA. I get to hear all about this stuff.

boomlinde 7y ago

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/boeing-737-max-8-at-least-4-potential-whistleblower-calls-made-to-faa-about-jetliner/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/boeing-737-max-8-at-least-4-pot...

Roark66 7y ago

I am surprised, but at the same time I'm aware that unfortunately there is an endemic lack of taking responsibility in many modern engineering professions. Software engineering being one of them. I often see by myself and read about other cases elsewhere of examples of badly designed and written software being put in place due to short shortsightedly perceived financial goals of doing so. I bet that every software engineer encountered such software in their career. Were the engineers that created it incompetent? Perhaps, but more likely is that they were put under pressure to deliver such flawed solutions, and people who said no were replaced with those that said yes no matter what. I recently watched a documentary about death penalty and how states couldn't get doctors to design the lethal injection because none would agree to work on it. I envy that doctors can have such integrity, but as a group we engineers have very little when money is involved.

ryandrake 7y ago
> Perhaps, but more likely is that they were put under pressure to deliver such flawed solutions, and people who said no were replaced with those that said yes no matter what. Early in my career I asked to not work on a project on ethical grounds, and my manager said “fine, Ted is fine with doing it, so I’ll assign you to a different project!” Years later I actually quit a job partially over objection to some less than ethical uses of the technology, and the boss never even broke a sweat. There were lines of developers out the door willing to replace me. Software engineering talent is effectively unlimited because we have no professional organization that caps supply, like doctors have. This leads to all kinds of races-to-the-bottom.
- AstralStorm 7y ago
  Until you get to the top of the accredited safety critical software developers. The cream of the crop. Note there is a supply limiter in the form of accreditation and another of typically requiring years of experience too.
bsder 7y ago
> I am surprised, but at the same time I'm aware that unfortunately there is an endemic lack of taking responsibility in many modern engineering professions. Software engineering being one of them. There is no such thing as "Software Engineer". You can't get a Professional Engineering license for it, nor can you be sued for not adhering to standards. The National Society for Professional Engineers (NSPE) was screaming for years that software people should not be allowed to call themselves engineers. They lost that battle, and here we are with your comment. And the all the resulting issues that the NSPE predicted. > I recently watched a documentary about death penalty and how states couldn't get doctors to design the lethal injection because none would agree to work on it. I envy that doctors can have such integrity, but as a group we engineers have very little when money is involved. This has nothing to do with integrity and everything to do with the fact that you could lose your medical license. You would have to offer a doctor enough money to cover the rest of their career, and states are notoriously cheap.

Kiro 7y ago

From the article you're replying to: "Indeed, in the aftermath of recent Boeing 737 MAX crashes, the media routinely and positively refers to disclosures by “Boeing whistleblowers.”"

afterburner 7y ago

The article states: > Indeed, in the aftermath of recent Boeing 737 MAX crashes, the media routinely and positively refers to disclosures by “Boeing whistleblowers.” So, I guess there are some whistleblowers?

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

manfredo 7y ago

Was there any actual malicious or reckless intent behind these events? From what I gathered, there were a whole chain of bad decisions: * Moving the engines higher and forward and keeping the same aircraft designation. * Patching this design change over with software to push forward on the yoke at high AOA. * Failing to account for AOA sensor failure. * A bad trim-resetting logic that let MCAS exert almost total authority over the elevators. * Poor pilot training on these new features All these things came together to make planes fall out of the sky, I'm not sure if there was any one individual that had the whole picture in their mind.