7 ms·

What’s there to consider even - political connections?

by gmerc 3y ago

thatguy0900 3y ago
Does the faa have enough qualified staff and budget to review boeings planes? Does anyone other than Boeing have them, since noone else does it? Legitimate question. Would you poach a bunch of engineers from the airlines/military?
- bombcar 3y ago
  You build it up over time by hiring direct from colleges (or even trade schools). It has to be a complete plan, not just a slap-dash "we can hire some people and the problem is solved". To do it best you do NOT hire from the industry, and if necessary you hire from unrelated industries (perhaps, for example, oil rig/pipeline inspectors).
- burnerthrow008 3y ago
  As a practical matter, the FAA might designate someone outside of Boeing to do the inspections (like maybe people from Lockheed or Grumman, who are not directly competing in the commercial airliner space). When you take a checkride at the end of training to earn your pilot certificate, it's not an FAA employee riding with you... it's a "DPE" or Designated Pilot Examiner, who is a private individual designated by the FAA to conduct check rides (and who often charges you a fee to administer the test). Occasionally an FAA employee will ride along with the student pilot and DPE to evaluate how the DPE is evaluating prospective pilots.
- jgeada 3y ago
  Isn't this the whole point of the "defund the government" approach? Deliberately sabotage the regulatory authorities, then use the fact that they no longer have the expertise and staff as a justification to outsource the regulation function over to the companies that were supposed to be inspected. And when it goes wrong, which it always does, make shocked pikachu face and claim that nothing can be done because we no longer have the capacity to regulate industry. This would be less infuriating if this was the first time, but it keeps happening again and again and people keep falling for it. It is immensely profitable for the few though, that might be why it keeps happening. The fix is easy, just requires time and budget: rebuild that expertise and refuse to certify anything until you have the necessary capabilities.
- tuetuopay 3y ago
  hire airbus to inspect boeing, and hire boeing to inspect airbus?
  - nottorp 3y ago
    That would be fun... or end with both manufacturers being completely grounded by the other and we back to canoes and horse carriages :)
    - tappdarden 3y ago
      I would love for trains to get more attention in the US. ...
- nottorp 3y ago
  If you read the analysis published after the MCAS disaster, self certification is something recent so the FAA at least used to have people.
iamtheworstdev 3y ago
The problem is that the FAA doesn't have the expertise. The people with the expertise all work for aircraft manufacturers. And odds are the FAA will never pay anyone enough to leave the manufacturers to do the job.
- ajcp 3y ago
  There are other ways to solution for the same outcome, or get closer to it. Pass regulation that requires audit and certification by a rated and licensed authority that isn't necessarily the government itself. As a publicly traded company Boeing already has to do this with its books; why not with its product too? I'm sure that E&Y, Deloitte, KPMG, or PwC would love a crack at a new market and they've certainly got the money to hire away from manufacturers.
- wolverine876 3y ago
  > The problem is that the FAA doesn't have the expertise. Do you know a basis for that? My understanding, though limited, is that they have incredible expertise - and we can see their outstanding results. Also, IME, this claim is used by many industries to assert that they shouldn't be subject to regulation, and (IME) it's always false.
  - randomdata 3y ago
    > Also, IME, this claim [...] it's always false. Of course it is false. Even if the regulation ultimately can't be enforced due to lack of the right people, the players can still be subject to the regulation. The two are not logically associated. Nobody is making that claim, though. What is the significance of this fun anecdote you pulled randomly from a hat?
hindsightbias 3y ago
Well, there are over 400K parts in a 737 and they're building more than one a day. How many of those need more inspection? How many inspectors do you want to apply to this problem? How much growth of the FAA? How many/long to do a ground up review of every Boeing inspection process? How much more do you want to pay for every flight? What will be the impact on Boeing pricing vs Airbus worldwide? HN is pretty strange these days. One day gov't is the problem, the next it is the only solution. We need "streamlining" of regulation for more nukes, but more regulation of Boeing because a door blew off over 100's of millions of flights. We need to get rid of the FAA and ATC and automate everything with software controls to prevent runway incursions. But we need to ban autonomous cars.

What’s there to consider even - political connections?

by gmerc 3y ago

What’s there to consider even - political connections?

Does the faa have enough qualified staff and budget to review boeings planes? Does anyone other than Boeing have them, since noone else does it? Legitimate question. Would you poach a bunch of engineers from the airlines/military?

bombcar 3y ago
You build it up over time by hiring direct from colleges (or even trade schools). It has to be a complete plan, not just a slap-dash "we can hire some people and the problem is solved". To do it best you do NOT hire from the industry, and if necessary you hire from unrelated industries (perhaps, for example, oil rig/pipeline inspectors).
burnerthrow008 3y ago
As a practical matter, the FAA might designate someone outside of Boeing to do the inspections (like maybe people from Lockheed or Grumman, who are not directly competing in the commercial airliner space). When you take a checkride at the end of training to earn your pilot certificate, it's not an FAA employee riding with you... it's a "DPE" or Designated Pilot Examiner, who is a private individual designated by the FAA to conduct check rides (and who often charges you a fee to administer the test). Occasionally an FAA employee will ride along with the student pilot and DPE to evaluate how the DPE is evaluating prospective pilots.
jgeada 3y ago
Isn't this the whole point of the "defund the government" approach? Deliberately sabotage the regulatory authorities, then use the fact that they no longer have the expertise and staff as a justification to outsource the regulation function over to the companies that were supposed to be inspected. And when it goes wrong, which it always does, make shocked pikachu face and claim that nothing can be done because we no longer have the capacity to regulate industry. This would be less infuriating if this was the first time, but it keeps happening again and again and people keep falling for it. It is immensely profitable for the few though, that might be why it keeps happening. The fix is easy, just requires time and budget: rebuild that expertise and refuse to certify anything until you have the necessary capabilities.
tuetuopay 3y ago
hire airbus to inspect boeing, and hire boeing to inspect airbus?
- nottorp 3y ago
  That would be fun... or end with both manufacturers being completely grounded by the other and we back to canoes and horse carriages :)
  - tappdarden 3y ago
    I would love for trains to get more attention in the US. ...
nottorp 3y ago
If you read the analysis published after the MCAS disaster, self certification is something recent so the FAA at least used to have people.

iamtheworstdev 3y ago

The problem is that the FAA doesn't have the expertise. The people with the expertise all work for aircraft manufacturers. And odds are the FAA will never pay anyone enough to leave the manufacturers to do the job.

ajcp 3y ago
There are other ways to solution for the same outcome, or get closer to it. Pass regulation that requires audit and certification by a rated and licensed authority that isn't necessarily the government itself. As a publicly traded company Boeing already has to do this with its books; why not with its product too? I'm sure that E&Y, Deloitte, KPMG, or PwC would love a crack at a new market and they've certainly got the money to hire away from manufacturers.
wolverine876 3y ago
> The problem is that the FAA doesn't have the expertise. Do you know a basis for that? My understanding, though limited, is that they have incredible expertise - and we can see their outstanding results. Also, IME, this claim is used by many industries to assert that they shouldn't be subject to regulation, and (IME) it's always false.
- randomdata 3y ago
  > Also, IME, this claim [...] it's always false. Of course it is false. Even if the regulation ultimately can't be enforced due to lack of the right people, the players can still be subject to the regulation. The two are not logically associated. Nobody is making that claim, though. What is the significance of this fun anecdote you pulled randomly from a hat?

hindsightbias 3y ago

Well, there are over 400K parts in a 737 and they're building more than one a day. How many of those need more inspection? How many inspectors do you want to apply to this problem? How much growth of the FAA? How many/long to do a ground up review of every Boeing inspection process? How much more do you want to pay for every flight? What will be the impact on Boeing pricing vs Airbus worldwide? HN is pretty strange these days. One day gov't is the problem, the next it is the only solution. We need "streamlining" of regulation for more nukes, but more regulation of Boeing because a door blew off over 100's of millions of flights. We need to get rid of the FAA and ATC and automate everything with software controls to prevent runway incursions. But we need to ban autonomous cars.