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Allowing two inspectors to pursue personal grudges against one of the most beloved figures in US aviation: https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=FAA+bob+hoover https

Allowing two inspectors to pursue personal grudges against one of the most beloved figures in US aviation: https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=FAA+bob+hoover https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=FAA+bob+hoover Five hundred and thirty seven people killed from the 737 max scandal, which showed the FAA was basically not providing any oversight of Boeing whatsoever, and even worse, was complicit in coverups: https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/18/22189609/faa-boeing-737-max-senate-report-coverup-tests-whistleblowers https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/18/22189609/faa-boeing-737-... Furthermore, the FAA was the last national agency in the world to ban the 737 Max from flying. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/business/boeing-737-crashes.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/business/boeing-737... That lack of supervision included the FAA providing little or no oversight over Boeing using lithium ion batteries without sufficient testing, resulting in several fires on airliners. Treating air traffic controllers so poorly - including underpaying them by nearly thirty percent, that they went on strike, and refusing to give them a shorter work week to compensate for the high stress nature of the job: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Air_Traffic_Controllers_Organization_(1968) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Air_Traffic_Contr... and since then, we've had decades upon decades of overworked, overstressed, understaffed air traffic controllers, which results in problems ranging from crashes due to errors to falling asleep to substance abuse: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=FAA+air+traffic+controllers+sleeping https://duckduckgo.com/?q=FAA+air+traffic+controllers+sleepi... https://duckduckgo.com/?q=FAA+air+traffic+controllers+drunk https://duckduckgo.com/?q=FAA+air+traffic+controllers+drunk A controller in Las Vegas has a stroke and was speaking gibberish for half an hour before anyone in the control tower noticed, likely because she was working alone and unsupervised. Am I forgetting anything? "Model of professionalism in civil service" my ass. This debacle over fueling is just yet another way the FAA has pointlessly stood in the way of progress to protect vested industry interests. FAA regulations are rife with all sorts of absurd shit barring a private pilot from modernizing their planes in cost effective manner or enhancing them with greater avionics capabilities.

_moof 4y ago
> Am I forgetting anything? Yes, the words "most" and "pockets of sheer insanity." I am not so simple-minded as to view an entire agency as a single, atomic entity. I recognize what they do well and am one of the harshest critics of what they do poorly, especially when the results are death. This is something I hoped I had conveyed in my original post.
- someguydave 4y ago
  I am willing to risk some deaths in exchange for technological improvements.
  - wolverine876 4y ago
    You are free to risk your own, but not mine.
    - xyzzyz 4y ago
      He is not, in fact, free to risk his own, that’s the entire point.
      - wolverine876 4y ago
        Sure they are. They can be a test pilot, jump off a cliff in a flight suit, whatever they like. Don't risk my life though.
        xyzzyz 4y ago
        > [you] can (…) jump off a cliff in a flight suit, This is in fact an argument against FAA: you can risk your life in many other ways in many other contexts not regulated by FAA, so why not be allowed to risk your own life in a regulated field?
        wolverine876 4y ago
        Because it involves risking other people's lives? I think that's pretty obvious, so maybe I'm missing something. You also can't risk your own life by driving on the wrong side of the highway.
        xyzzyz 4y ago
        No, it does not involve any of that. You just assume that because it is convenient for your argument, but the truth is that there are plenty of ways to risk your own life flying with negligible risk to anyone else. Think, for example, about racing home made cars on salt flats: perfectly legal, even though you could conceivably hit someone who just happens to stroll by. Why can’t I race my home made plane over salt flats? Also, even if you follow FAA rules, you’re still risking other people lives. Pretty much every nontrivial activity is potentially lethal to bystanders, and flying is even more so. Despite that, flying is still allowed in general. You cannot argue “activity X that has some minor risk to you and nonzero risk to bystanders should be disallowed, because you must not expose bystanders to risk”, when you are already allowed to expose them to bigger risks in other ways in the context of the same regulated activity. You do not want to engage my actual argument, which is why you are trying to reframe it in a context where it is absurd. Of course I’m not suggesting that people should be allowed to drive 100 mph on the wrong side of busy freeway, and the reason you need to suggest that I do is that you are unable to engage what I actually say.
p_l 4y ago
From my understanding, in most places in USA ATC is provided by private enterprises contracted for the role, not as civil service - a direct effect of the Reagan crackdown. This has interesting knock on effects, for example if private company ATC fucks up and gives you bad information, you don't have much in terms of options for example to dispute charges that you deliberately violated a presidential no fly zone.
- throwawaylinux 4y ago
  > for example if private company ATC fucks up and gives you bad information, you don't have much in terms of options for example to dispute charges that you deliberately violated a presidential no fly zone. Why would ATC being public or private contractor for public agency change your legal situation here?
  - lmm 4y ago
    If they were public you'd be able to FOIA their records? And/or get access to them in discovery since they're part of the plantiff organisation.
    - p_l 4y ago
      The case I heard of, which did involve bad information leading to getting intercepted, the fact that the ATC was subcontracted to private organization meant that it was extra hard (if not impossible, at the time I've read about the case they were still trying to find a way) to get any information regarding ATC operation that could at least lead to a witness for the trial.
- xyzzyz 4y ago
  If you’re given wrong wrong instruction by a public agency, it is highly likely that you have literally no recourse whatsoever, due to sovereign and qualified immunity.
  - p_l 4y ago
jiggawatts 4y ago
> Am I forgetting anything? Yes! They completely failed to notice that 5G was a thing, and that thing was going to be deployed everywhere, including near airports. They had like a decade to plan for it and any potential impact it might have on planes. Now they're panicking and trying to hold up a nationwide 5G rollout because they were asleep at the wheel.
- zugi 4y ago
  Even worse than being asleep at the wheel, that may have been a political power play between the FCC and the FAA, each trying to increase their power and budget, with consumers getting the raw end of the deal...
- p_l 4y ago
  They weren't asleep at the wheel - pretty sure they were involved in discussions that led to larger guard bands etc deployed elsewhere. FCC is the one that sold problematic spectrum before work was done (and yes, work was being done, and it's not trivial to deal with spectrum change like that)

_moof 4y ago

> Am I forgetting anything? Yes, the words "most" and "pockets of sheer insanity." I am not so simple-minded as to view an entire agency as a single, atomic entity. I recognize what they do well and am one of the harshest critics of what they do poorly, especially when the results are death. This is something I hoped I had conveyed in my original post.

someguydave 4y ago
I am willing to risk some deaths in exchange for technological improvements.
- wolverine876 4y ago
  You are free to risk your own, but not mine.
  - xyzzyz 4y ago
    He is not, in fact, free to risk his own, that’s the entire point.
    - wolverine876 4y ago
      Sure they are. They can be a test pilot, jump off a cliff in a flight suit, whatever they like. Don't risk my life though.
      - xyzzyz 4y ago
        > [you] can (…) jump off a cliff in a flight suit, This is in fact an argument against FAA: you can risk your life in many other ways in many other contexts not regulated by FAA, so why not be allowed to risk your own life in a regulated field?
        wolverine876 4y ago
        Because it involves risking other people's lives? I think that's pretty obvious, so maybe I'm missing something. You also can't risk your own life by driving on the wrong side of the highway.
        xyzzyz 4y ago
        No, it does not involve any of that. You just assume that because it is convenient for your argument, but the truth is that there are plenty of ways to risk your own life flying with negligible risk to anyone else. Think, for example, about racing home made cars on salt flats: perfectly legal, even though you could conceivably hit someone who just happens to stroll by. Why can’t I race my home made plane over salt flats? Also, even if you follow FAA rules, you’re still risking other people lives. Pretty much every nontrivial activity is potentially lethal to bystanders, and flying is even more so. Despite that, flying is still allowed in general. You cannot argue “activity X that has some minor risk to you and nonzero risk to bystanders should be disallowed, because you must not expose bystanders to risk”, when you are already allowed to expose them to bigger risks in other ways in the context of the same regulated activity. You do not want to engage my actual argument, which is why you are trying to reframe it in a context where it is absurd. Of course I’m not suggesting that people should be allowed to drive 100 mph on the wrong side of busy freeway, and the reason you need to suggest that I do is that you are unable to engage what I actually say.

p_l 4y ago

From my understanding, in most places in USA ATC is provided by private enterprises contracted for the role, not as civil service - a direct effect of the Reagan crackdown. This has interesting knock on effects, for example if private company ATC fucks up and gives you bad information, you don't have much in terms of options for example to dispute charges that you deliberately violated a presidential no fly zone.

throwawaylinux 4y ago
> for example if private company ATC fucks up and gives you bad information, you don't have much in terms of options for example to dispute charges that you deliberately violated a presidential no fly zone. Why would ATC being public or private contractor for public agency change your legal situation here?
- lmm 4y ago
  If they were public you'd be able to FOIA their records? And/or get access to them in discovery since they're part of the plantiff organisation.
  - p_l 4y ago
    The case I heard of, which did involve bad information leading to getting intercepted, the fact that the ATC was subcontracted to private organization meant that it was extra hard (if not impossible, at the time I've read about the case they were still trying to find a way) to get any information regarding ATC operation that could at least lead to a witness for the trial.
xyzzyz 4y ago
If you’re given wrong wrong instruction by a public agency, it is highly likely that you have literally no recourse whatsoever, due to sovereign and qualified immunity.
- p_l 4y ago

jiggawatts 4y ago

> Am I forgetting anything? Yes! They completely failed to notice that 5G was a thing, and that thing was going to be deployed everywhere, including near airports. They had like a decade to plan for it and any potential impact it might have on planes. Now they're panicking and trying to hold up a nationwide 5G rollout because they were asleep at the wheel.

zugi 4y ago
Even worse than being asleep at the wheel, that may have been a political power play between the FCC and the FAA, each trying to increase their power and budget, with consumers getting the raw end of the deal...
p_l 4y ago
They weren't asleep at the wheel - pretty sure they were involved in discussions that led to larger guard bands etc deployed elsewhere. FCC is the one that sold problematic spectrum before work was done (and yes, work was being done, and it's not trivial to deal with spectrum change like that)