13 ms·

Work on production line of Boeing 737 Max ‘not adequately funded’

243 points by ksajadi 7y ago

throwaway3627 7y ago
I'm surprised almost no one is also talking about the 2010 Boeing subcontractor Ducommun 737 NG (-600/700/800/900) critical structural elements deficiencies scandal and coverup Al Jazeera exposed. Several passengers have also already died from this on runway overruns and hard landings when the fuselage breaks up whereas it didn't used to happen on previous 737's.
- acqq 7y ago
  It is obviously still an unknown story. Some details: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/16150378-post10.html https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/16150378-post10.html
  - Calloutman 7y ago
    It's somewhat amusing to see the pilots in that thread criticise airbus for having computer systems that take control away from the pilot, given what we now know about MCAS.
    - acqq 7y ago
      It's irrelevant for this thread, which is about: "If you're Boeing, you realize you have a multi-billion dollar liability on your hands that will bankrupt your company 10 times over if you actually had to tear apart and inspect or rebuild all the suspect aircraft. So, you bury the reports, fire anyone involved, call in all your favors and unleash your lawyers with all the political power you have as a major defense contractor to make it all go away. (The program suggested that's exactly what they were doing)." Also, the link to the program summary: https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/peopleandpower/2010/12/20101214104637901849.html https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/peopleandpower/2010/12/...
- King-Aaron 7y ago
  Got any links/resources on this? Interestingly I haven't heard anything about it
- reimertz 7y ago
  Here is the video documentary by Al Jazeera for said scandal: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaWdEtANi-0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaWdEtANi-0 I just watched it. This is bad. Boeing, with the help of the American government, is covering up serious issues with how the 737NG is being built with faulty parts.
akerl_ 7y ago
I look at this and see surprising parallels to the Wells Fargo scandal ( https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2018-10-23/fake-accounts-still-haunt-wells-fargo https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2018-10-23/fake-a... ). In both cases, management appears to have applied significant pressure to the teams doing the work, pushing them to achieve extremely unrealistic targets. And in both cases, the results of that incentive ended up being extremely detrimental to basically everybody (to the general public in the form of identity fraud / unsafe aircraft, to the companies in the forms of fines / grounding / PR / etc). I doubt anybody in Boeing’s offices woke up and thought “what a nice morning! Time to go to work and build some dangerous airplanes that will kill people, so that I can get slightly richer”. I suspect the execs involved were just amazingly (and potentially even criminally) negligent: in their minds, they were pushing their employees to make the airplane actually similar enough to qualify as a “minor” change, without any of the oversight that would have caught what was actually happening. They turned a blind eye any time somebody told them that the new plane would require larger changes, and the results are unsurprising: their teams declared all the changes “minor”, not because they’d successfully made only minor changes, but because exec pressure mandated that all changes be “minor”.
- lnsru 7y ago
  While reading your text I was thinking about Volkswagen, diesel cars and their defeat devices. This article (sorry for German only writing) https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/verkehr/audi-abgasskandal-betrugssoftware-diesel-defeat-device/ https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/verkehr/audi-abgasskanda... states exactly opposite! The VW guys were writing poems for their clever defeat device! I am pretty sure, that some people at Boeing were also clapping hands about sales potential and cost savings of the new planes. There are more evil people in the corporate floors than you think. And top management plays with them!!! There is no way to build in defeat device in millions of cars without top management agreeing. I can guess, that Boeing’s management had enough clues, that their software wasn’t in the best shape.
  - keyme 7y ago
    There is always at least one guy that really does understand the implications, is in the position to make changes, but proceeds anyway.
cryptozeus 7y ago
For once i hope these x employees come forward before these incidents...Nothing new in this article, article is being posted for this “Watch BBC Panorama: Boeing's Killer Plane, on 29 July at 8.30pm on BBC One.”
- raxxorrax 7y ago
  The dark side of that is that in contrast to management, employees face far harsher penalties than a million dollar settlement. You will only get that if you have "responsibility".
qwsxyh 7y ago
The free market working at its most efficient.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- bsaul 7y ago
  I’m curious to understand what you mean by free market. Civil aviation is probably among the most regulated industry you could find, isn’t it ?
  - neuronic 7y ago
    With free market he means that the FAA outsourced certification to Boeing. They did it in order to cut costs and save resources.
  - cultus 7y ago
    Actually, it looks as if it wasn't that strictly regulated, hence the hundreds of deaths because Boeing was allowed to self-certify. The magic of the free market was indeed at work here, producing value for shareholders.
    - fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
      Their competitors were highly regulated, preventing them from existing in the first place. As always in incumbent firm wrote the regulations and defacto decides who is in violation or not.
      - cultus 7y ago
        The economy cannot be separated from the government. If large capitalist interests exist, they will exert power with the government, in the form of influencing regulations or other rent-seeking. Thus you cannot have a "fair" capitalist economy. It would be nice if capitalism worked as it did in econ classes, but it doesn't with real humans.
farseer 7y ago
>>Since 2013, Boeing has paid $17bn (£13.74bn) in dividends to shareholders and has spent a further $43bn buying its own shares - a spending spree that has helped Boeing treble its share price in just five years. Are share buy backs a common strategy for large companies?
- fcantournet 7y ago
  For the last ~10 years yes. Almost all big companies that are profitable do it. This is actually a major problem for innovation and investments in general, there are lots of economist who talk about this issue: Mariana Mazzucato has some very convincing arguments for public investments based, among other things, on this very problem. (neo-liberal) Governments lower corporate taxes to boost corporate profit in the (unfunded) hope that this will drive massive investments in innovation and create job, and bigCo just buy their stock back because it is by far the most profitable short-term for their shareholders and their executives. Major reason is : they don't know what else to do. There was a very cool article on HN about the specific Boeing case that went over how it changed in the last 20y to go from engineering company to finance-driven company
  - chii 7y ago
    > Major reason is : they don't know what else to do no, they just don't like the risk of innovation. A share buy-back program is guarenteed to increase the share price, which is benefitial to executives who hold their bonuses in shares (and share holders would also like it). Doing innovation comes with risks - which may or may not pan out. If it doesn't pan out, the executives would get chewed for it, and if it does pan out it is unlikely to pay off for a long time (in terms of bonuses - at least, not within their tenure). Gov'ts should just invest in startups, rather than give tax breaks. Invest in up and coming students who show promise, and get to claim a share of their innovation as taxes as well! And if it fails, it fails - the gov't doesn't need to be profitable.
    - throw0101a 7y ago
      Yes, it is prudent to invest capital back into the company (R&D), but it may not be the best use of money or have the best ROI. It should also be noted that share buy-backs are also useful to shareholders as an alternative to dividends. Whereas a dividend creates a tax event that an investor may nor may not welcome, the same investor can choose to sell their stock or hang on to it. Financially speaking, if you start with $1000 in stocks, it does not matter whether you end up with $1000 in stock and $100 in cash from dividends, or $1100 in stocks (from the price going up). * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpXI_Vd51dA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpXI_Vd51dA And yet companies that payout dividends are not vilified the same was as buy-back companies--in fact dividend payers are lauded in an almost fetishist way due to human psychology: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_accounting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_accounting
fcantournet 7y ago
Classic SemVer :D
ecmascript 7y ago
I will never ever get into one of those planes, whatever they rename it to and however many updates they push.
- ekianjo 7y ago
  On the contrary this will probably be one of the safest planes to fly once they fix all issues (assuming they can) since no other plane would have undergone such in depth review and testing ever.
  - chopin 7y ago
    How do you know they fixed all issues? Surely all issues will be fixed which the regulators can find. But I am sure there will be cover-up still. And more to it regulators have clearly demonstrated their incapability and unwillingness to find something.
    - junipertea 7y ago
      How do you know all the previous planes have no issues at all? The only way you truly know is the track record and we do need to give the Max or its successor the benefit of doubt at some point. What's the point of having regulations of we don't believe in them anyway and depend on feelings? Of course, the regulations allowed 300+ people to die, but that's a thing to be fixed and improved.
      - saiya-jin 7y ago
        It could go as something like this - since we know how much safety was omitted in chase of profit, we see the most common problems. But airplanes are massively complex, and compromises could have been done on thousands of other places. Those could start failing after 10+ years of service for example, or in some rather unusual corner cases. Faith is a funny thing - once lost, it needs to be massively overcompensated to come to similar levels as before, and even after that things are just not the same...
      - 7y ago
ekianjo 7y ago
Why are they showing the compensation vs Boeing revenues in the beginning? Does Boeing pay for compensation directly? I thought this was rather paid by insurance companies, and had nothing to do with manufacturers?
- desdiv 7y ago
  Boeing voluntarily paid compensation to the victims and their communities directly. This is in addition to the travel insurance claims that the victims could file for. [0] https://boeing.mediaroom.com/2019-07-03-Boeing-Pledges-Support-to-Families-Communities-Affected-by-Lion-Air-Flight-610-and-Ethiopian-Airlines-Flight-302-Accidents https://boeing.mediaroom.com/2019-07-03-Boeing-Pledges-Suppo...
Causality1 7y ago
>We have always held true to our values of safety, quality and integrity and those values are complementary and mutually reinforcing with productivity and company performance It says something very bad about the state of accountability in this country when someone's negligence can kill hundreds of people and they have absolutely nothing to fear from putting out a completely horseshit statement like that. Half a dozen different Boeing executives should be in prison for the rest of their lives on 346 counts of manslaughter but I'd be amazed if Boeing faces so much as a monetary fine.
- ekianjo 7y ago
  do you pass the same judgment on car manufacturers since they are also somewhat responsible for numerous deaths every single year?
  - Causality1 7y ago
    Indeed I do. For example, the Takata corporation negligently ignored many warnings that its airbags were unsafe. This resulted in hundreds of injuries and the deaths of 24 people. The Takata corporation was fined ~250% of its annual EBIT and three of its executives were prosecuted. For Boeing, a comparable fine would be thirty billion dollars. If you multiplied the fine by the ratio of deaths, the fine would be over 420 billion dollars.
    - ekianjo 7y ago
      That would bankrupt Boeing. That's probably not a desirable outcome for such a company - and this would discourage any investment in aviation moving on.
      - AJ007 7y ago
        Or it would clear the playing field, at least in the US.
      - Marsymars 7y ago
        For reference, Takata was bankrupted, and its assets sold off.
mlang23 7y ago
Anyone surprised that an U.S. company was actively trying to bypass regulations to boost commercial success? If money is all you are aiming for, putting people at risk is suddenly not a problem at all.
- neuronic 7y ago
  But caring for anythings else than money is socialism!
- qaq 7y ago
  Right this would never happen in EU oh wait VW AG
crististm 7y ago
"Boeing said it wasn't relying on the single sensor, because the pilots were there as back up." Pilots are part of the redundancy package?! NO! Pilots are not part of your hardware!! Imagine the contrast from what we've been told for years that aviation hardware is about redundancy and what really is going on in their management offices.
crististm 7y ago
It is my hope that whatever bureaucratic process that allowed that to happen will be chopped into pieces, burned into ashes and scattered into the four winds. Whatever will remain can continue building planes if it still can.
sundvor 7y ago
"We did not cut corners or push the 737 Max out before it was ready," The family and friends of 346 people would beg to disagree.
WhoBeI 7y ago
What will the certification process for the next plane from Boeing look like? The FAA certified a plane that had obvious flaws. From what I understand they out sourced the certification process to Boeing but that doesn't remove their responsibility, it's still their "stamp". The real certification process started after the accidents and only needed a few weeks to find additional flaws. I'd assume the process is normally months long so "a few weeks" would be finding it early. But why should I trust the FAA? They seem to be working hard now projecting an image of a for-the-people agency while throwing as much dirt as they can on Boeing but I haven't really seen anything addressing their own problems with out sourcing, corruption, and political interference. Have I missed something?
- askvictor 7y ago
  I don't know what the US certification will look like, but I'd bet on the European certification being independent and very rigorous.
  - fred_is_fred 7y ago
    If its independent and vigorous how did the MAX get through to begin with?
    - MichaelApproved 7y ago
      That's a good question and one Canada and EU are asking themselves. https://globalnews.ca/news/5072383/canada-eu-reviewing-certification-boeing-737-max/ https://globalnews.ca/news/5072383/canada-eu-reviewing-certi... > Canada and the European Union say they are re-examining the approval it gave Boeing 737 MAX jets, following reports of a U.S. investigation into the Federal Aviation Administration certification of the aircraft.
    - ceejayoz 7y ago
      That's the will part in "will look like". Expect the procedure to change, a lot.
    - mcv 7y ago
jfnixon 7y ago
Want to see senior management laser focused on safety? Require forfeiture of all benefits, options, and bonuses, plus all personal cap gains from stock sales in the event of an engineering flaw resulting in loss of life. Claw it back from all senior management who worked during the lifetime of the airliner, even if they left or retired. You'll see the midnight oil being burned on walnut row, and fanatical effort going into testing and design reviews.
- esoterica 7y ago
  That’s a terrific way to ensure no want ever wants to work on aviation or infrastructure projects ever again. I guess they can come work on adtech like the rest of us.
  - jfnixon 7y ago
    It is a bit tongue in cheek, but giving the top couple of layers some serious skin in the game is the only way to align their interest with safety rather than the next 10-Q.
- WrtCdEvrydy 7y ago
  Never gonna happen.
smz2 7y ago
"We did not cut corners or push the 737 Max out before it was ready," it said. After two crashes and the groundings, i would say they did. Of course that's not what all of this is about, just their pr dept.
cosmodisk 7y ago
I am so called self taught developer.I learned how to write software out of boredom at work. Subsequently,I wrote some parts of the system,my current employer uses,that range from 'nice to have' all the way to 'mission critical'. I allowed myself a lot of freedom in terms of errors, mistakes and etc. The company provides training to people,so the worst that can happen is someone may not get a correct email or internal user won't see an update on training they were expecting.Now if I were working for Boeing and had to write code that'd go into production,aka a working plane,I'd probably either say I couldn't do it or do so many iterations that they'd would sack me...I couldn't sleep for the rest of the life knowing that I pushed some update that ultimately controls some parts of the plane and that it can go wrong any time...

243 points by ksajadi 7y ago

I'm surprised almost no one is also talking about the 2010 Boeing subcontractor Ducommun 737 NG (-600/700/800/900) critical structural elements deficiencies scandal and coverup Al Jazeera exposed. Several passengers have also already died from this on runway overruns and hard landings when the fuselage breaks up whereas it didn't used to happen on previous 737's.

acqq 7y ago
It is obviously still an unknown story. Some details: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/16150378-post10.html https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/16150378-post10.html
- Calloutman 7y ago
  It's somewhat amusing to see the pilots in that thread criticise airbus for having computer systems that take control away from the pilot, given what we now know about MCAS.
  - acqq 7y ago
    It's irrelevant for this thread, which is about: "If you're Boeing, you realize you have a multi-billion dollar liability on your hands that will bankrupt your company 10 times over if you actually had to tear apart and inspect or rebuild all the suspect aircraft. So, you bury the reports, fire anyone involved, call in all your favors and unleash your lawyers with all the political power you have as a major defense contractor to make it all go away. (The program suggested that's exactly what they were doing)." Also, the link to the program summary: https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/peopleandpower/2010/12/20101214104637901849.html https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/peopleandpower/2010/12/...
King-Aaron 7y ago
Got any links/resources on this? Interestingly I haven't heard anything about it
reimertz 7y ago
Here is the video documentary by Al Jazeera for said scandal: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaWdEtANi-0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaWdEtANi-0 I just watched it. This is bad. Boeing, with the help of the American government, is covering up serious issues with how the 737NG is being built with faulty parts.

akerl_ 7y ago

I look at this and see surprising parallels to the Wells Fargo scandal ( https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2018-10-23/fake-accounts-still-haunt-wells-fargo https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2018-10-23/fake-a... ). In both cases, management appears to have applied significant pressure to the teams doing the work, pushing them to achieve extremely unrealistic targets. And in both cases, the results of that incentive ended up being extremely detrimental to basically everybody (to the general public in the form of identity fraud / unsafe aircraft, to the companies in the forms of fines / grounding / PR / etc). I doubt anybody in Boeing’s offices woke up and thought “what a nice morning! Time to go to work and build some dangerous airplanes that will kill people, so that I can get slightly richer”. I suspect the execs involved were just amazingly (and potentially even criminally) negligent: in their minds, they were pushing their employees to make the airplane actually similar enough to qualify as a “minor” change, without any of the oversight that would have caught what was actually happening. They turned a blind eye any time somebody told them that the new plane would require larger changes, and the results are unsurprising: their teams declared all the changes “minor”, not because they’d successfully made only minor changes, but because exec pressure mandated that all changes be “minor”.

lnsru 7y ago
While reading your text I was thinking about Volkswagen, diesel cars and their defeat devices. This article (sorry for German only writing) https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/verkehr/audi-abgasskandal-betrugssoftware-diesel-defeat-device/ https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/verkehr/audi-abgasskanda... states exactly opposite! The VW guys were writing poems for their clever defeat device! I am pretty sure, that some people at Boeing were also clapping hands about sales potential and cost savings of the new planes. There are more evil people in the corporate floors than you think. And top management plays with them!!! There is no way to build in defeat device in millions of cars without top management agreeing. I can guess, that Boeing’s management had enough clues, that their software wasn’t in the best shape.
- keyme 7y ago
  There is always at least one guy that really does understand the implications, is in the position to make changes, but proceeds anyway.

cryptozeus 7y ago

For once i hope these x employees come forward before these incidents...Nothing new in this article, article is being posted for this “Watch BBC Panorama: Boeing's Killer Plane, on 29 July at 8.30pm on BBC One.”

raxxorrax 7y ago
The dark side of that is that in contrast to management, employees face far harsher penalties than a million dollar settlement. You will only get that if you have "responsibility".

qwsxyh 7y ago

The free market working at its most efficient.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
bsaul 7y ago
I’m curious to understand what you mean by free market. Civil aviation is probably among the most regulated industry you could find, isn’t it ?
- neuronic 7y ago
  With free market he means that the FAA outsourced certification to Boeing. They did it in order to cut costs and save resources.
- cultus 7y ago
  Actually, it looks as if it wasn't that strictly regulated, hence the hundreds of deaths because Boeing was allowed to self-certify. The magic of the free market was indeed at work here, producing value for shareholders.
  - fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
    Their competitors were highly regulated, preventing them from existing in the first place. As always in incumbent firm wrote the regulations and defacto decides who is in violation or not.
    - cultus 7y ago
      The economy cannot be separated from the government. If large capitalist interests exist, they will exert power with the government, in the form of influencing regulations or other rent-seeking. Thus you cannot have a "fair" capitalist economy. It would be nice if capitalism worked as it did in econ classes, but it doesn't with real humans.

farseer 7y ago

>>Since 2013, Boeing has paid $17bn (£13.74bn) in dividends to shareholders and has spent a further $43bn buying its own shares - a spending spree that has helped Boeing treble its share price in just five years. Are share buy backs a common strategy for large companies?

fcantournet 7y ago
For the last ~10 years yes. Almost all big companies that are profitable do it. This is actually a major problem for innovation and investments in general, there are lots of economist who talk about this issue: Mariana Mazzucato has some very convincing arguments for public investments based, among other things, on this very problem. (neo-liberal) Governments lower corporate taxes to boost corporate profit in the (unfunded) hope that this will drive massive investments in innovation and create job, and bigCo just buy their stock back because it is by far the most profitable short-term for their shareholders and their executives. Major reason is : they don't know what else to do. There was a very cool article on HN about the specific Boeing case that went over how it changed in the last 20y to go from engineering company to finance-driven company
- chii 7y ago
  > Major reason is : they don't know what else to do no, they just don't like the risk of innovation. A share buy-back program is guarenteed to increase the share price, which is benefitial to executives who hold their bonuses in shares (and share holders would also like it). Doing innovation comes with risks - which may or may not pan out. If it doesn't pan out, the executives would get chewed for it, and if it does pan out it is unlikely to pay off for a long time (in terms of bonuses - at least, not within their tenure). Gov'ts should just invest in startups, rather than give tax breaks. Invest in up and coming students who show promise, and get to claim a share of their innovation as taxes as well! And if it fails, it fails - the gov't doesn't need to be profitable.
  - throw0101a 7y ago
    Yes, it is prudent to invest capital back into the company (R&D), but it may not be the best use of money or have the best ROI. It should also be noted that share buy-backs are also useful to shareholders as an alternative to dividends. Whereas a dividend creates a tax event that an investor may nor may not welcome, the same investor can choose to sell their stock or hang on to it. Financially speaking, if you start with $1000 in stocks, it does not matter whether you end up with $1000 in stock and $100 in cash from dividends, or $1100 in stocks (from the price going up). * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpXI_Vd51dA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpXI_Vd51dA And yet companies that payout dividends are not vilified the same was as buy-back companies--in fact dividend payers are lauded in an almost fetishist way due to human psychology: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_accounting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_accounting

fcantournet 7y ago

Classic SemVer :D

ecmascript 7y ago

I will never ever get into one of those planes, whatever they rename it to and however many updates they push.

ekianjo 7y ago
On the contrary this will probably be one of the safest planes to fly once they fix all issues (assuming they can) since no other plane would have undergone such in depth review and testing ever.
- chopin 7y ago
  How do you know they fixed all issues? Surely all issues will be fixed which the regulators can find. But I am sure there will be cover-up still. And more to it regulators have clearly demonstrated their incapability and unwillingness to find something.
  - junipertea 7y ago
    How do you know all the previous planes have no issues at all? The only way you truly know is the track record and we do need to give the Max or its successor the benefit of doubt at some point. What's the point of having regulations of we don't believe in them anyway and depend on feelings? Of course, the regulations allowed 300+ people to die, but that's a thing to be fixed and improved.
    - saiya-jin 7y ago
      It could go as something like this - since we know how much safety was omitted in chase of profit, we see the most common problems. But airplanes are massively complex, and compromises could have been done on thousands of other places. Those could start failing after 10+ years of service for example, or in some rather unusual corner cases. Faith is a funny thing - once lost, it needs to be massively overcompensated to come to similar levels as before, and even after that things are just not the same...
    - 7y ago

ekianjo 7y ago

Why are they showing the compensation vs Boeing revenues in the beginning? Does Boeing pay for compensation directly? I thought this was rather paid by insurance companies, and had nothing to do with manufacturers?

desdiv 7y ago
Boeing voluntarily paid compensation to the victims and their communities directly. This is in addition to the travel insurance claims that the victims could file for. [0] https://boeing.mediaroom.com/2019-07-03-Boeing-Pledges-Support-to-Families-Communities-Affected-by-Lion-Air-Flight-610-and-Ethiopian-Airlines-Flight-302-Accidents https://boeing.mediaroom.com/2019-07-03-Boeing-Pledges-Suppo...

Causality1 7y ago

>We have always held true to our values of safety, quality and integrity and those values are complementary and mutually reinforcing with productivity and company performance It says something very bad about the state of accountability in this country when someone's negligence can kill hundreds of people and they have absolutely nothing to fear from putting out a completely horseshit statement like that. Half a dozen different Boeing executives should be in prison for the rest of their lives on 346 counts of manslaughter but I'd be amazed if Boeing faces so much as a monetary fine.

ekianjo 7y ago
do you pass the same judgment on car manufacturers since they are also somewhat responsible for numerous deaths every single year?
- Causality1 7y ago
  Indeed I do. For example, the Takata corporation negligently ignored many warnings that its airbags were unsafe. This resulted in hundreds of injuries and the deaths of 24 people. The Takata corporation was fined ~250% of its annual EBIT and three of its executives were prosecuted. For Boeing, a comparable fine would be thirty billion dollars. If you multiplied the fine by the ratio of deaths, the fine would be over 420 billion dollars.
  - ekianjo 7y ago
    That would bankrupt Boeing. That's probably not a desirable outcome for such a company - and this would discourage any investment in aviation moving on.
    - AJ007 7y ago
      Or it would clear the playing field, at least in the US.
    - Marsymars 7y ago
      For reference, Takata was bankrupted, and its assets sold off.

mlang23 7y ago

Anyone surprised that an U.S. company was actively trying to bypass regulations to boost commercial success? If money is all you are aiming for, putting people at risk is suddenly not a problem at all.

neuronic 7y ago
But caring for anythings else than money is socialism!
qaq 7y ago
Right this would never happen in EU oh wait VW AG

crististm 7y ago

"Boeing said it wasn't relying on the single sensor, because the pilots were there as back up." Pilots are part of the redundancy package?! NO! Pilots are not part of your hardware!! Imagine the contrast from what we've been told for years that aviation hardware is about redundancy and what really is going on in their management offices.

crististm 7y ago

It is my hope that whatever bureaucratic process that allowed that to happen will be chopped into pieces, burned into ashes and scattered into the four winds. Whatever will remain can continue building planes if it still can.

sundvor 7y ago

"We did not cut corners or push the 737 Max out before it was ready," The family and friends of 346 people would beg to disagree.

WhoBeI 7y ago

What will the certification process for the next plane from Boeing look like? The FAA certified a plane that had obvious flaws. From what I understand they out sourced the certification process to Boeing but that doesn't remove their responsibility, it's still their "stamp". The real certification process started after the accidents and only needed a few weeks to find additional flaws. I'd assume the process is normally months long so "a few weeks" would be finding it early. But why should I trust the FAA? They seem to be working hard now projecting an image of a for-the-people agency while throwing as much dirt as they can on Boeing but I haven't really seen anything addressing their own problems with out sourcing, corruption, and political interference. Have I missed something?

askvictor 7y ago
I don't know what the US certification will look like, but I'd bet on the European certification being independent and very rigorous.
- fred_is_fred 7y ago
  If its independent and vigorous how did the MAX get through to begin with?
  - MichaelApproved 7y ago
    That's a good question and one Canada and EU are asking themselves. https://globalnews.ca/news/5072383/canada-eu-reviewing-certification-boeing-737-max/ https://globalnews.ca/news/5072383/canada-eu-reviewing-certi... > Canada and the European Union say they are re-examining the approval it gave Boeing 737 MAX jets, following reports of a U.S. investigation into the Federal Aviation Administration certification of the aircraft.
  - ceejayoz 7y ago
    That's the will part in "will look like". Expect the procedure to change, a lot.
  - mcv 7y ago

jfnixon 7y ago

Want to see senior management laser focused on safety? Require forfeiture of all benefits, options, and bonuses, plus all personal cap gains from stock sales in the event of an engineering flaw resulting in loss of life. Claw it back from all senior management who worked during the lifetime of the airliner, even if they left or retired. You'll see the midnight oil being burned on walnut row, and fanatical effort going into testing and design reviews.

esoterica 7y ago
That’s a terrific way to ensure no want ever wants to work on aviation or infrastructure projects ever again. I guess they can come work on adtech like the rest of us.
- jfnixon 7y ago
  It is a bit tongue in cheek, but giving the top couple of layers some serious skin in the game is the only way to align their interest with safety rather than the next 10-Q.
WrtCdEvrydy 7y ago
Never gonna happen.

smz2 7y ago

"We did not cut corners or push the 737 Max out before it was ready," it said. After two crashes and the groundings, i would say they did. Of course that's not what all of this is about, just their pr dept.

cosmodisk 7y ago

I am so called self taught developer.I learned how to write software out of boredom at work. Subsequently,I wrote some parts of the system,my current employer uses,that range from 'nice to have' all the way to 'mission critical'. I allowed myself a lot of freedom in terms of errors, mistakes and etc. The company provides training to people,so the worst that can happen is someone may not get a correct email or internal user won't see an update on training they were expecting.Now if I were working for Boeing and had to write code that'd go into production,aka a working plane,I'd probably either say I couldn't do it or do so many iterations that they'd would sack me...I couldn't sleep for the rest of the life knowing that I pushed some update that ultimately controls some parts of the plane and that it can go wrong any time...