4 ms·

Not getting pilots retrained was the cost saving strategy for companies buying the new area aircrafts.

WalterBright 5y ago
Not needing retraining was a good goal because it improves safety. Sometimes airplanes have crashed because in a crisis the pilot did the right thing for another airplane he was trained on, but was the wrong thing for what he was piloting at the moment. It's not just a cost saving measure. MCAS was a sound concept. It's implementation, however, was not sound at all.
- asd4232 5y ago
  A typical pilot switches aircraft type multiple times in their career. It's all about the cost and convenience ultimately, allowing same pilots to fly both 737MAX and the older 737NG as most 737MAX customers operate both. As far as MCAS goes, in my opinion Airbus got it right already in the 80's in their A320 with their flight envelope protection.
- wikfwikf 5y ago
  Do you understand how delusional it sounds in this specific context to say that not needing retraining improves safety? Not that it might improve safety or should improve safety, but that it does improve safety?
  - rramadass 5y ago
    Rightly said!
  - dpark 5y ago
    "Not needing retraining" is another way of saying "works as expected". Yes, it would likely have been safer if the 737 Max worked as expected by the pilots flying it.
- mannykannot 5y ago
  > Not needing retraining was a good goal because it improves safety. That only works if retraining is not actually needed. Boeing's own test program gave adequate (but undisclosed, at the time) information for an independent observer to conclude that this was not the case here.
- VBprogrammer 5y ago
  I'm not sure I could agree that MCAS is a sound concept. Moving the trim automatically to account for the pitch up at high angles of attack feels like a hack, like restarting a dodgy service every couple of hours rather than fixing the underlying issues. I've never understood why the fix wasn't implemented in the elevator feel computer. Except perhaps that it doesn't have AoA inputs and it's an old hydroelectrical system for which there may be a lack detailed knowledge.

Not needing retraining was a good goal because it improves safety. Sometimes airplanes have crashed because in a crisis the pilot did the right thing for another airplane he was trained on, but was the wrong thing for what he was piloting at the moment. It's not just a cost saving measure. MCAS was a sound concept. It's implementation, however, was not sound at all.

asd4232 5y ago
A typical pilot switches aircraft type multiple times in their career. It's all about the cost and convenience ultimately, allowing same pilots to fly both 737MAX and the older 737NG as most 737MAX customers operate both. As far as MCAS goes, in my opinion Airbus got it right already in the 80's in their A320 with their flight envelope protection.
wikfwikf 5y ago
Do you understand how delusional it sounds in this specific context to say that not needing retraining improves safety? Not that it might improve safety or should improve safety, but that it does improve safety?
- rramadass 5y ago
  Rightly said!
- dpark 5y ago
  "Not needing retraining" is another way of saying "works as expected". Yes, it would likely have been safer if the 737 Max worked as expected by the pilots flying it.
mannykannot 5y ago
> Not needing retraining was a good goal because it improves safety. That only works if retraining is not actually needed. Boeing's own test program gave adequate (but undisclosed, at the time) information for an independent observer to conclude that this was not the case here.
VBprogrammer 5y ago
I'm not sure I could agree that MCAS is a sound concept. Moving the trim automatically to account for the pitch up at high angles of attack feels like a hack, like restarting a dodgy service every couple of hours rather than fixing the underlying issues. I've never understood why the fix wasn't implemented in the elevator feel computer. Except perhaps that it doesn't have AoA inputs and it's an old hydroelectrical system for which there may be a lack detailed knowledge.