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The reason people are outraged is that "don't use a single sensor to decide that the plane should perform an uncontrollable nose-dive" isn't the outcome of new

The reason people are outraged is that "don't use a single sensor to decide that the plane should perform an uncontrollable nose-dive" isn't the outcome of new learning. That wasn't competent airworthiness seventy years ago. It's a lesson the industry thought it had already internalized. We shouldn't applaud mistakes of the distant part being repeated recklessly as some kind of improvement.

mantap 7y ago
What seems to have happened is that the system was originally designed with more conservative parameters. Testing showed that these parameters were insufficient to prevent a stall so they "turned it up to 11", and didn't re-evaluate the original design.
- salawat 7y ago
  It wasn't that it wasn't sufficient. It was that they found similar behavior happening in a low-speed part of the flight envelope. That required increasing the authority and losing the G-load safeguard.
- jussij 7y ago
  > "turned it up to 11", and didn't re-evaluate the original design. In other words they thru all engineers principals out the window. Now there is no doubt this is exactly what happened. But the bigger question is why did this happen and why was it allowed to happen?
jussij 7y ago
What amazes me about this whole sorry saga is what appears to be blatant deception on the part of Boeing. Boeing somehow tricked the FAA into believing, from the pilots perspective the 737-MAX and 737 were the exact same plane. That allowed the plane to enter service quickly as it meant the pilots would not require any flight simulator retraining. What we now know is the 737-MAX is nothing like the 737 and the level of deception that seems to have occurred is concerning.
- sopooneo 7y ago
  I don't think they "tricked [them] into believing". More like "talked them into accepting".
  - bronson 7y ago
    More like deceived: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/failed-certification-faa-missed-safety-issues-in-the-737-max-system-implicated-in-the-lion-air-crash/%3famp=1 https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.seattletimes.com/business/b... Whether it was intentional to meet the schedule or accidental, we may never know.
  - taneq 7y ago
    The only difference between these two descriptions is whether the FAA implicitly understood that the MAX is NOT the same as the 737. If yes, then they were talked into accepting it anyway. If no, then they were tricked (unless Boeing genuinely believed that there was no difference, which is clearly false.)
    - nolok 7y ago
      The kind of people who work at the FAA jobs where those decision are made know enough about planes to realize that a different engine placement is not without effect. That alone means they should at least have done extensive testing internally, which they didn't since it was pretty much clear they used the older 737 simulators / didn't have 737 MAX simulators.
  - salawat 7y ago
    This is a very common phenomena that as Quality Assurance you specifically have to work around when talking to regulators, and there are in fact, white collar cultural norms in place which shape the way most corporations I've worked at talk about potential regulatory risks. For one thing, if you bring up any questions regarding an issue at all, the preferred medium of communicating it until a decision is made tends to be direct person to person with no electronic paper trail. (This insulates the company from getting caught out by E-Discovery in case of legal troubles). Secondly, there's the practice I call anchoring. This is where you go to the regulator with a very narrow, refined question looking for an answer, explain why you think it's a good idea, and hope they don't think too much into it before saying yes you can do it. If it works, you have a document stating the regulator told you it was okay when you asked. To prevent this, you have to go to your regulator and give them a high and wide view. A) What is the problem B) What are the relevant regulations impacted C) What additional risks are created with both answers Businesses can be a bit squirmy when engineering folks start getting too chummy with compliance. I know I've found a good one when I don't get funny looks when asking if something questionable sounding has been run passed Compliance. Everything I've read in this investigation reeks of anchoring toward the FAA. Especially given the whistleblower testimony as reported in the 60 Minutes Expose on the MAX. [1]https://m.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DaO7_indbfME&ved=2ahUKEwje2sfB84njAhXULc0KHcwuCrUQwqsBMAB6BAgHEAU&usg=AOvVaw2APCLXMqKKxa5mxQOnsmvo https://m.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DaO7_indbfME&ved=2ahUKEwje2...

mantap 7y ago

What seems to have happened is that the system was originally designed with more conservative parameters. Testing showed that these parameters were insufficient to prevent a stall so they "turned it up to 11", and didn't re-evaluate the original design.

salawat 7y ago
It wasn't that it wasn't sufficient. It was that they found similar behavior happening in a low-speed part of the flight envelope. That required increasing the authority and losing the G-load safeguard.
jussij 7y ago
> "turned it up to 11", and didn't re-evaluate the original design. In other words they thru all engineers principals out the window. Now there is no doubt this is exactly what happened. But the bigger question is why did this happen and why was it allowed to happen?

jussij 7y ago

What amazes me about this whole sorry saga is what appears to be blatant deception on the part of Boeing. Boeing somehow tricked the FAA into believing, from the pilots perspective the 737-MAX and 737 were the exact same plane. That allowed the plane to enter service quickly as it meant the pilots would not require any flight simulator retraining. What we now know is the 737-MAX is nothing like the 737 and the level of deception that seems to have occurred is concerning.

sopooneo 7y ago
I don't think they "tricked [them] into believing". More like "talked them into accepting".
- bronson 7y ago
  More like deceived: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/failed-certification-faa-missed-safety-issues-in-the-737-max-system-implicated-in-the-lion-air-crash/%3famp=1 https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.seattletimes.com/business/b... Whether it was intentional to meet the schedule or accidental, we may never know.
- taneq 7y ago
  The only difference between these two descriptions is whether the FAA implicitly understood that the MAX is NOT the same as the 737. If yes, then they were talked into accepting it anyway. If no, then they were tricked (unless Boeing genuinely believed that there was no difference, which is clearly false.)
  - nolok 7y ago
    The kind of people who work at the FAA jobs where those decision are made know enough about planes to realize that a different engine placement is not without effect. That alone means they should at least have done extensive testing internally, which they didn't since it was pretty much clear they used the older 737 simulators / didn't have 737 MAX simulators.
- salawat 7y ago
  This is a very common phenomena that as Quality Assurance you specifically have to work around when talking to regulators, and there are in fact, white collar cultural norms in place which shape the way most corporations I've worked at talk about potential regulatory risks. For one thing, if you bring up any questions regarding an issue at all, the preferred medium of communicating it until a decision is made tends to be direct person to person with no electronic paper trail. (This insulates the company from getting caught out by E-Discovery in case of legal troubles). Secondly, there's the practice I call anchoring. This is where you go to the regulator with a very narrow, refined question looking for an answer, explain why you think it's a good idea, and hope they don't think too much into it before saying yes you can do it. If it works, you have a document stating the regulator told you it was okay when you asked. To prevent this, you have to go to your regulator and give them a high and wide view. A) What is the problem B) What are the relevant regulations impacted C) What additional risks are created with both answers Businesses can be a bit squirmy when engineering folks start getting too chummy with compliance. I know I've found a good one when I don't get funny looks when asking if something questionable sounding has been run passed Compliance. Everything I've read in this investigation reeks of anchoring toward the FAA. Especially given the whistleblower testimony as reported in the 60 Minutes Expose on the MAX. [1]https://m.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DaO7_indbfME&ved=2ahUKEwje2sfB84njAhXULc0KHcwuCrUQwqsBMAB6BAgHEAU&usg=AOvVaw2APCLXMqKKxa5mxQOnsmvo https://m.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DaO7_indbfME&ved=2ahUKEwje2...