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>I have no idea how that company will ever earn back my trust Millions of ongoing safe flights? I dunno. I feel like they're getting savaged (which they deserv
by jquery 7y ago
>I have no idea how that company will ever earn back my trust
Millions of ongoing safe flights? I dunno. I feel like they're getting savaged (which they deserve... to a point... but we will cross that point I am pretty sure, if we haven't already...)
The thousands (tens of thousands?) of safe flights per day don't make the news. Boeing has been a pioneer in the safest form of transportation in existence. Mentour Pilot (an active 737 pilot on YouTube) goes into detail about why he's not concerned about Boeing (any more than he's concerned about Airbus).
I can also share a story from my (late) father who worked at Boeing from 30 years (and was working at Boeing during the MAX crashes). I asked him why Boeing let the 737-MAX debacle happen. These were a dying man's words (paraphrased): "Boeing wanted to ground the plane after the first 737-MAX crash but the FAA refused until after the second crash. Boeing did not have the authority to unilaterally ground the planes."
Take that for what it's worth.
- tempguy9999 7y agoIf that quote is so[x], that casts a very deep shadow over the FAA. They've gone from handing off their responsibility for validation to outright rejecting the safety advice of the maker of the aircraft. [x] and I don't mean that to doubt you but I hope you understand I can't be absolute on this without verification
- jquery 7y agoKeep in mind I don’t know exactly how those conversations went between Boeing and the FAA, nor do I know exactly who my dad was referring to when he said Boeing (the head of engineering? head of safety? A group of people inside Boeing? Was Boeing unified in its opinion or was this concentrated in the area of engineering my father worked in?) Grounding an entire class of plane is not a decision made lightly because of the huge financial and political implications. My takeaway is Boeing leaned towards grounding and the FAA did not and on balance the plane stayed in the air while Boeing worked on the fixes.* *EDIT: This is probably a conversation that happens after every crash/major-incident and hindsight is 20/20.
- mikeash 7y agoBoeing probably doesn’t have the ability to ground their fleet with legal force, but if they said, “these planes aren’t safe, don’t fly them until we can investigate and fix,” most airlines would listen and I don’t think the FAA could somehow block this.
- brokenmachine 7y agoA statement like that would also be corporate suicide. Imagine the lawsuits.
- mikeash 7y agoWould it really be worse than having a government agency forcibly ground your planes for safety reasons?
- brokenmachine 7y agoIANAL but I think Boeing exposes themselves to less liability with FAA making the decision to ground them to investigate.
- jquery 7y agoI’m not absolving Boeing of responsibility, just adding some color to the conversation.
- blackflame7000 7y agoIf you look at the Top 7 safest airplanes in terms of accidents per hours flown you get: 1) Airbus A340 - No crashes 2) Boeing 777 - 5 crashes, 2 intentional (Malaysia x2), 1 engine-related (Rolls-Royce problem), 2 pilot-error (Asiana/Dubai) - [Thanks fishywang] 3) Boeing 747-8 4) Boeing 737-NG 5) Boeing 767 6) Airbus A320 7) Boeing 757
- fishywang 7y agoDid you miss the Asiana 777 at SFO? Or is that engine-related?
- FDSGSG 7y agoThat one was stupidity-related.
- jquery 7y agoI was always irrationally nervous flying into SFO, worried about precisely what ended up happening. We should all be glad the plane mostly held together through the cartwheel, saving many lives.
- WalterBright 7y agoI can confidently assert that no airframe is designed with cartwheeling in mind. Nor hitting trees/buildings/cliffs.
- jquery 7y agoTrue, it's not part of the certification process, but I do know that modern jets airframes are made to be as... um... "flexible"* (? searching for the word here...) as possible in catastrophic situations. An older airframe probably would have disintegrated under the same forces. Luck and good fortune also played a huge role of course. What the pilots did was unconscionably neglectful. CFIT is often (usually?) fatal for all passengers. *EDIT: It's similar to software that's written to be extremely robust that encounters an unexpected error (or set of errors). The software wasn't necessarily designed to handle it, but sometimes it can nonetheless.