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> What is the endgame now for 737 MAX planes? The bugs will be addressed and they'll still fly. Airlines have no choice, there's a limited capacity in the worl
by erentz 7y ago
> What is the endgame now for 737 MAX planes?
The bugs will be addressed and they'll still fly. Airlines have no choice, there's a limited capacity in the world for airplane construction, several thousands of orders on the books for the 737 and 320 waiting to be filled. What can an airline do? They can cut back some orders but not all orders.
> I'd honestly like to see the 737 MAX taken out of service and Boeing simply ending this line.
I have an alternate history fantasy where instead of going with the MAX and then trying to kill the C-series as they did, they instead bought into the C-series. Swapping the cockpit for a Boeing cockpit design. Built the -500 stretch of the C-series, and then used the C-series to replace the 737 line in the <165 pax market. And moved ahead on the 797/NMA for which they'd have a shorter version covering the 200-270 pax market as a pure passenger mover as it's proposed.
- joe_the_user 7y agoI'm not an engineer but what about: A) Adding two more angle-of-attack sensors so a pilot can be reasonably sure of auto-adjust will work. Retrofitting those would be expensive, of course. B) Put the two buttons back the way they were and add a "light" indicator an angle-of-attack sensor failure. C) More pilot simulator training so pilots know what to expect in the unusual situation that the system fails. I suspect the answer would be: "Even now we're not willing to bite the bullet and pay all the expenses we were dodging before". Searching, it seems Southwest already did something like this (after the first crash, in fact). The problem might be that if Boeing does this on their dime then Boeing would be essentially giving every one of their "bargain" customers the features of their "luxury" customers, which I would speculate might be a vastly expensive proposition especially if it sets precedent going forward. https://theaircurrent.com/aviation-safety/southwest-airlines-is-adding-new-angle-of-attack-indicators-to-its-737-max-fleet/ https://theaircurrent.com/aviation-safety/southwest-airlines...
- CydeWeys 7y agoYou need three redundant sensors for safety-critical systems, so that if one fails you know which one is failing. Airbus has three AoA sensors (and three of others as well) on their planes for this reason. And it's worth pointing out that 737s already have two of these sensors, but don't use them both for MCAS (?!?!).
- Xixi 7y agoThe A350 has 4 AoA sensors: I suspect it is a lesson learned from an A320 that had 2 AoA sensors froze in the same position, outvoting the only AoA sensor that was still working. In other words: failures are not always independent.
- __m 7y agoWouldn’t they eventually all freeze at roughly the same position when the AoA doesn’t change for a while? Can’t they be heated?
- rurban 7y agoThey are heated now, after the Air France loss. This incident was also the reason for the MCAS system in the first hand: "Don't trust the pilot, regulate it into safety by your own".
- presto8 7y agoAre you referring to AF447? According to the BEA incident report, the AF447 plane was already equipped with heating systems for the pitot probes and AoA sensors. "1.6.9.1 Probe heating The probes that are installed on the aircraft are heated electrically to remove water by vaporisation when the aeroplane is on the ground and to protect them from icing in flight." Reference: https://www.bea.aero/docspa/2009/f-cp090601.en/pdf/f-cp090601.en.pdf https://www.bea.aero/docspa/2009/f-cp090601.en/pdf/f-cp09060...
- rurban 7y agoRight, I mixed that up. With AF447 the initial problem was not the AOA but the very common pitot tube icing, which renders the airspeed indicator useless, thus leading to wrong stall warnings. Even if the pitot tube is heated (mandatory), very often airframe icing leads to a blocked static port, rendering even more indicators useless. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitot-static_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitot-static_system
- moioci 7y agoAs long as safety is regarded as a luxury feature, these failures will continue to happen.
- Aeolun 7y agoIt’s very expensive, but not nearly as expensive as losing all their 737 Max orders.
- old-gregg 7y ago> The bugs will be addressed and they'll still fly. The engines are mounted incorrectly, so much so that Boeing believed pilots need the assistance of MCAS on take-off now. The bug isn't with its algorithms, rather the need for MCAS to begin with. They can't "address" it. That's why I'll be very careful not to ever book a flight on a 737 Max, probably easier to simply stick to Airbus-only airlines: Jetblue, Alaska/Virgin, etc.
- rdl 7y agoAlaska is Boeing, Virgin is Airbus, Alaska/Virgin is primarily Boeing...
- inferiorhuman 7y agoAnd Bombardier and Embraer.
- samstave 7y agoYup: https://www.vox.com/videos/2019/4/15/18306644/boeing-737-max-crash-video https://www.vox.com/videos/2019/4/15/18306644/boeing-737-max...
- jhayward 7y ago> The engines are mounted incorrectly, so much so that Boeing believed pilots need the assistance of MCAS on take-off now. This overstates the issue. The engine mounting changes the flight characteristics enough that the MAX 8 needs to be flown differently in certain corners of the flight envelope. The MCAS was added to avoid having to re-train pilots or trigger a new type certification. The engine mounting certainly does not make the plane unsafe.
- EdwardDiego 7y agoWhy is this commenter grey in my thread? They are absolutely correct, and anyone who disagrees really needs to say why.
- JudgeWapner 7y ago
- thereare5lights 7y ago> Airlines have no choice, there's a limited capacity in the world for airplane construction, No choice? It's a choice between risking passengers' lives and money. Be real about what the choice is.
- neotek 7y agoIf we're being real about the choice, then you also have to include the reality that many airlines would go under if they suddenly had to retire their MAX 8 fleet and weren't immediately able to replace them with other aircraft. A great many more people would have their lives severely impacted by the closure of a major airline than by a plane crash.
- CaptainZapp 7y agoThe bugs will be addressed and they'll still fly. Airlines have no choice, there's a limited capacity in the world for airplane construction, several thousands of orders on the books for the 737 and 320 waiting to be filled While true I don't think that airlines and regulators will go for it, if there's even the slightest risk of an additional accident. No matter what. And Boeing's "communcation strategy" after the incidents doesn't really help to instill confidence in the plane.
- rpiguy 7y agoConversely I don’t see how they can’t be returned to the sky. Boeing has deep pockets and the US government will push behind the scenes to make sure it happens, regardless of whatever public statements they make. There is no way regulators will be able to keep this plane grounded simply on the ground of politics.
- acct1771 7y agoYou're saying we literally can't stop our representatives/"regulators" from getting us killed anymore. Lovely.
- rpiguy 7y agoBoth accidents could have been avoided if the pilots knew about the changes in handling and in MCAS and how to handle it. So this is not the kind of flaw that would make a plane uncertifiable or unflyable. Combine that with Boeing’s strong lobbying efforts and importance to the US economy, it is a certainty the planes will fly.
- rtkwe 7y agoThe simple solution would be to just remove MCAS and take the certification as a new plane. Boeing might have to eat the retraining costs but it's got to be better than eating the cost of the planes should they be deemed unfit for purpose and Boeing sued by every airline to recoup the costs of the now useless planes. There's also the possible hardware fix to add an additional AoA sensor and change the software to limit the total deflection allowed + add a way to disable the MCAS only while keeping the electronic trim. The plane itself isn't irredeemable by a long shot though.
- eCa 7y ago> Airlines have no choice Anecdotal: I know of at least one family that booked a trip on a non-Boeing airline, at additional cost, to avoid risking being on a Max. Imagine that after the Max is back in service, that there is a serious incident in the first few months - it doesn't have to be fatal, just a close call of some kind - how many more customers will avoid the Max at all costs?
- user5994461 7y agoHow do you know the plane model before you board? It's not shown when buying the ticket, it's not written on the ticket either.
- sean_the_geek 7y agoSome airlines do! Qatar and Emirates, I think.
- kmlx 7y agobut they rotate them quite a lot, don’t they? i booked a boeing 787 dreamliner but ended up in a crummy 777 from a decade ago.
- ricardobeat 7y agoIt should be there among the flight itinerary data, often hidden behind an accordion or tooltip.
- gpm 7y agoDelta showed me when buying online. Let me select seats too.
- josecastillo 7y agoYou can avoid airlines that have the 737 MAX in their fleet (domestically, the biggest are United, Southwest and American). Whenever I fly I fly Delta, and I’ll never fly on a MAX because Delta doesn’t have any.
- jeanl 7y ago
- grumdan 7y ago> Airlines have no choice, there's a limited capacity in the world for airplane construction, several thousands of orders on the books for the 737 and 320 waiting to be filled. What can an airline do? They can cut back some orders but not all orders. In a world that had actually severe consequences for corporate negligence, regulators would force Boeing to let airlines cancel/change all orders, and compensate them for the 737 Max models they already shipped to them, as they cannot be flown safely. Boeing's behavior does not indicate that they are interested in properly fixing this problem as opposed to getting it certified via corporatism / the FAA allowing them to perform a big part of their own checks.
- thucydidesofusa 7y agoDang, that alternate history fantasy is something the management of Boeing needs to read. That's so spot on - something like that would have changed the skies. Imagine how many secondary cities could have come online if airlines had cheap 116/141/165 seaters. I wonder if that would have left too large a gap between the largest C-series and the smallest NMA, you can argue that both would be relentlessly optimized and it'd be really hard for the A320neos to compete on either end.
- fred_is_fred 7y agoThey won't fly if customers won't fly on them. The first part of the rehab will be renaming and rebranding the product to reduce customer stigma.