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I encourage everyone to never, ever fly a 737 MAX under any circumstances. Boeing has not been sufficiently punished (as in their future behavior will change).

I encourage everyone to never, ever fly a 737 MAX under any circumstances. Boeing has not been sufficiently punished (as in their future behavior will change). If people refuse to fly the 737 MAX, hopefully they go bankrupt and the existing management can be replaced.

Aloha 6y ago
Why would I refuse to fly in a perfectly safe airplane? I'm not punishing Boeing, I'm punishing Southwest and American Airlines at that point - and probably myself too, as I live immensely close to DFW (I just heard an airplane land).
- eganist 6y ago
  Southwest and AA would be incentivized to pursue recourse if it turns out their faith was placed in a product as a result of deception or fraud... but this is even more true if consumers punish the airlines for falling victim to such deception in the first place.
- caconym_ 6y ago
  This "perfectly safe airplane" has been grounded for almost two years after two crashes killed 346 people. The root cause of these crashes is a mind-bogglingly irresponsible bit of design that can be linked directly to decision makers at Boeing deciding to prioritize corporate profits over human lives. I don't have a hard time believing that we won't see any more MCAS-related trim runaway accidents after the scrutiny of the past two years, but what evidence do we have that the dysfunctional leadership behind this particular flaw is the exception rather than the rule? When the Max was flying, it was still extremely unlikely that you'd die on one, but dying is a pretty big deal (to me, at least). For the foreseeable future, I'll be choosing alternatives to Boeing when they're available.
  - throwaway201103 6y ago
    Problems are easy to see in retrospect. You could have made similar arguments after every air crash that was caused by a design flaw. These problems are found, fixed, lessons learned, new rules enacted, and we move on.
    - redis_mlc 6y ago
      > Problems are easy to see in retrospect. Excuse me, that's nonsense in the case of the 737 MAX. MCAS problems were known in advance by Boeing factory pilots. They sent each other sms messages about it, for which one Boeing manager was fired. The certification paperwork filed with the FAA misrepresented the MCAS behavior, under-reporting the rate and number of pitch downs. MCAS was designed to rely on a single AoA sensor, which was external and subject to damage from jetways, birds and weather. And the software was outsourced to a low bidder paying programmers $15/hour. We'll see how that works for safety-critical aerospace software. But the most sinister thing is that this all resulted from a contractual item - that Boeing would have to pay Southwest $1 million per plane that required re-training. So any concerns about safety were side-stepped to meet that perverse incentive.
    - salawat 6y ago
      No, no they weren't. The problems we have is an organization tasked with transporting millions over the timespan of a year at speeds approaching Mach 1 ended up in tge position whereby financial growth outpaced it's primary reason for existence. To manufacture and support the distribution, operation, and uptake of safe passenger airplanes. Until you get rid of that modus operandi from the upper management, you'll not see a significant culture change.
      - Gibbon1 6y ago
        One thing I noticed about VW, their management culture changed a bit after the German government tossed a couple of managers in prison. I think the key thing is a fine is always just another line on the spreadsheet.
    - bronson 6y ago
      Iterating works well with software but not so well with airplanes. And, you must admit that Boeing has shown utter disregard for rules through this process.
JanSolo 6y ago
Glad to hear that we have a US DOT Judge here who can decide how much punishment is due. What do you deem as sufficient, your honour?
- iratewizard 6y ago
  Who doesn't want their own personal retinue to command around, though?
na85 6y ago
They do too much business on the Defence side of things for this to bankrupt them.
chance_state 6y ago
> If people refuse to fly the 737 MAX, hopefully they go bankrupt and the existing management can be replaced. Lol. As if Boeing would ever be allowed to go out of business.

Aloha 6y ago

Why would I refuse to fly in a perfectly safe airplane? I'm not punishing Boeing, I'm punishing Southwest and American Airlines at that point - and probably myself too, as I live immensely close to DFW (I just heard an airplane land).

eganist 6y ago
Southwest and AA would be incentivized to pursue recourse if it turns out their faith was placed in a product as a result of deception or fraud... but this is even more true if consumers punish the airlines for falling victim to such deception in the first place.
caconym_ 6y ago
This "perfectly safe airplane" has been grounded for almost two years after two crashes killed 346 people. The root cause of these crashes is a mind-bogglingly irresponsible bit of design that can be linked directly to decision makers at Boeing deciding to prioritize corporate profits over human lives. I don't have a hard time believing that we won't see any more MCAS-related trim runaway accidents after the scrutiny of the past two years, but what evidence do we have that the dysfunctional leadership behind this particular flaw is the exception rather than the rule? When the Max was flying, it was still extremely unlikely that you'd die on one, but dying is a pretty big deal (to me, at least). For the foreseeable future, I'll be choosing alternatives to Boeing when they're available.
- throwaway201103 6y ago
  Problems are easy to see in retrospect. You could have made similar arguments after every air crash that was caused by a design flaw. These problems are found, fixed, lessons learned, new rules enacted, and we move on.
  - redis_mlc 6y ago
    > Problems are easy to see in retrospect. Excuse me, that's nonsense in the case of the 737 MAX. MCAS problems were known in advance by Boeing factory pilots. They sent each other sms messages about it, for which one Boeing manager was fired. The certification paperwork filed with the FAA misrepresented the MCAS behavior, under-reporting the rate and number of pitch downs. MCAS was designed to rely on a single AoA sensor, which was external and subject to damage from jetways, birds and weather. And the software was outsourced to a low bidder paying programmers $15/hour. We'll see how that works for safety-critical aerospace software. But the most sinister thing is that this all resulted from a contractual item - that Boeing would have to pay Southwest $1 million per plane that required re-training. So any concerns about safety were side-stepped to meet that perverse incentive.
  - salawat 6y ago
    No, no they weren't. The problems we have is an organization tasked with transporting millions over the timespan of a year at speeds approaching Mach 1 ended up in tge position whereby financial growth outpaced it's primary reason for existence. To manufacture and support the distribution, operation, and uptake of safe passenger airplanes. Until you get rid of that modus operandi from the upper management, you'll not see a significant culture change.
    - Gibbon1 6y ago
      One thing I noticed about VW, their management culture changed a bit after the German government tossed a couple of managers in prison. I think the key thing is a fine is always just another line on the spreadsheet.
  - bronson 6y ago
    Iterating works well with software but not so well with airplanes. And, you must admit that Boeing has shown utter disregard for rules through this process.

JanSolo 6y ago

Glad to hear that we have a US DOT Judge here who can decide how much punishment is due. What do you deem as sufficient, your honour?

iratewizard 6y ago
Who doesn't want their own personal retinue to command around, though?

na85 6y ago

They do too much business on the Defence side of things for this to bankrupt them.

chance_state 6y ago

> If people refuse to fly the 737 MAX, hopefully they go bankrupt and the existing management can be replaced. Lol. As if Boeing would ever be allowed to go out of business.