7 ms·

Smoke in the cabin of two 737 MAX caused by Load Reduction Device system [video]

242 points by dz0ny 2y ago

DrNosferatu 2y ago
One more reason not to fly Ryanair!
dz0ny 2y ago
This is a issue that may also affect Airbus aircraft, but so far, it has only caused problems on two Boeing planes. Like MCAS, it was not disclosed to pilots, prompting the FAA to recommend design changes and notify flight crews. https://simpleflying.com/boeing-cfm-international-update-737-max-software-keep-smoke-entering-cockpit-after-2-bird-strikes/ https://simpleflying.com/boeing-cfm-international-update-737...
- K0balt 2y ago
  Unfortunately, it seems that the internal FAA recommendations were not allowed to make their way into any kind of airworthiness directive. The recommendations include very basic procedure changes that mitigate the near term risks without any significant impact to operation, as well as recommendations for what probably amounts to a software change and upgrades to some of the pilot oxygen masks to effect a permanent fix. The only reason that we even know about the internal recommendations is that they were leaked to the press. Boeing released a pilot bulletin that basically says to go through the checklist quickly and to treat smoke in the cabin as a major failure, but stops short of recommending some very, very simple steps in aircraft configuration prior to takeoff that would completely mitigate the issue without negatively effecting flight performance. The major recommendation in the internal FAA bulletin is to use the APU bleed instead of the main engine bleed air to power the air conditioning and cabin pressurisation during the takeoff phase of flight, below 3000 feet AGL. I can see no reason to drag feet on this recommendation, other than the uncomfortable suggestion that perhaps this issue should have been addressed during certification. (It is yet another difference from older 737 design , like the deadly MCAS system, that was not disclosed to pilots transitioning to the new aircraft)
  - db48x 2y ago
    > […] stops short of recommending some very, very simple steps in aircraft configuration prior to takeoff that would completely mitigate the issue […] Well, the configuration changes during takeoff mitigate the issue if it happens during takeoff. If it happens at any other time then they don’t do anything to help. > I can see no reason to drag feet on this recommendation […] I can. Perhaps the FAA believes that it is better to minimize change fatigue. Since the problem can apparently be fixed in software, and Boeing has decided to make that fix, they might want to write just one airworthiness directive requiring everyone to install it instead of two, one telling pilots to adopt some procedure followed by another telling them to abandon it. > (It is yet another difference from older 737 design , like the deadly MCAS system, that was not disclosed to pilots transitioning to the new aircraft) Keep in mind that for most aircraft the airline can pick and choose between different engines. The pilots don’t have to learn the myriad different engineering decisions that go into those engines; from the pilot’s perspective they are supposed to be interchangeable.
    - garaetjjte 2y ago
      >Perhaps the FAA believes that it is better to minimize change fatigue. Additionally you might want to avoid the association that specific pack supplies air to the cockpit, as it varies across generations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kegworth_air_disaster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kegworth_air_disaster
      - db48x 2y ago
        Oooh, that’s rough.
    - karavelov 2y ago
      > Well, the configuration changes during takeoff mitigate the issue if it happens during takeoff. If it happens at any other time then they don’t do anything to help. There are no birds at higher altitudes
      - db48x 2y ago
- berkut 2y ago
  It's not clear that is does affect Airbus does it? It looks like only the LEAP-1b engines are affected by this, and I was under the impression that LEAP-1b was 737-MAX-only? (A320 has LEAP-1a as far as I can see).
  - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
    he covers this in the video, but both engines have the same LRD (Load reduction device), but it's more about how the bleed system is done on if it's an impact or not, and he doesn't know if the other planes have the same flaw or not.
  - fransje26 2y ago
    From [1], it looks like the 737 flight deck ventilation bypasses the mix manifold. This does not seem to be the case for the A320 family of jets. [2] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAy_ch6sfOQ&t=1707s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAy_ch6sfOQ&t=1707s [2] https://youtu.be/4Yf-0_UTbRs?feature=shared&t=311 https://youtu.be/4Yf-0_UTbRs?feature=shared&t=311 https://youtu.be/4Yf-0_UTbRs?feature=shared&t=311 https://youtu.be/4Yf-0_UTbRs?feature=shared&t=311
- mercutio2 2y ago
  Of course MCAS was disclosed to pilots, the idea that it wasn’t is ridiculous to the point of absurdity. Boeing has gone off the rails, but the general lack of nuance in the common narrative about their failures is really over the top. MCAS is how a fundamentally different plane behaves (in most cases) like a normal 737. The fact that such a system exists is described, and disclosed, in minute detail to pilots when they get their mandatory training on the 737-MAX. The specific name wasn’t used in the training, and that’s where this ridiculous narrative came from.
  - cameldrv 2y ago
    The manual described Elevator Feel Shift, Speed Trim, and Stall Management Yaw Damper. It describes the scenarios in which each of these systems activate and what effect they have. MCAS uses the same hardware but has different scenarios in which it activates and has a different effect. Not knowing of the existence of MCAS and not having a viable procedure to deactivate it if it went haywire was critical to the two accidents. I've looked into this a lot and to my knowledge this was never disclosed to pilots. Can you provide a reference to MCAS being disclosed prior to the two accidents?
toomuchtodo 2y ago
“Load reduction device.” https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1497965 https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1497965
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
hypothesis 2y ago
I wonder what was the thought process there: hey we save an engine maybe, but everyone inside the plane gets cooked in 39 seconds. Ship it! Comments on that youtube video are filled with industry insiders and it’s just wild. They even think someone has died from a similar fuming event back in December…
- Havoc 2y ago
  Maybe they were thinking the Russian solution. If it crashes fast enough nobody finds out what happened
- K0balt 2y ago
  It doesn’t save the engine, it keeps it from ripping the wing off. It’s a good system. The part about filling the cabin with smoke because they couldn’t be bothered to make the software that detects the extreme vibration tell the AC units from that engine to shut down (which they already do if the rpm drops, indicating an engine failure-just not soon enough or reliable enough to prevent the smoke issue) - not so much. The system for the ECU to detect the engine mount failure condition already exists. The function to shut down the air handlers in response to a different indicator of engine failure already exists in the ECU. It’s just literally “also shut down if the engine mounts fail”, but the guys that sit around and think about the what ifs were given early retirement to make room for more MBAs.
  - hypothesis 2y ago
    > It doesn’t save the engine, it keeps it from ripping the wing off. It’s a good system. Sure, I get that it was added to prevent plane from disintegrating, but like you said integration thinking is gone and now we have those individual components that sure look homicidal from outside. The other issue is that regulators are missing in action or worse. It’s no way to run the industry by relying on concerned youtubers..
    - K0balt 2y ago
      I’m with you on all of this. It’s like all of the grownups left the building and the inmates are running the asylum. Frikken clown world hijinks.
MobiusHorizons 2y ago
I found this to be a fascinating dive into a potentially serious safety concern. I was impressed how simple the mitigations could be based on the recommendations in the report. I find the evidence credible for an attempt to burry the issue, but honestly I don't understand the motivation. At this stage I feel Boeing and the FAA could really stand to gain some good press from being extra proactive about such issues. Especially when the proposed mitigations seem like they would be relatively easy to implement, and should not be expensive for airlines from what I can see. It seems like the source being the engine manufacturer and consequently having the potential of affecting other jets including potentially the airbus A320 would only improve the incentives for Boeing to get out ahead of this, and demonstrate a safety culture. Does anyone understand the motivations that could lead to the response we have seen from the FAA and Boeing?
- apical_dendrite 2y ago
  From what I've read, CFM and Boeing committed back in December to making the software fix that's suggested in the video. https://aerospaceglobalnews.com/news/bird-strike-incident-sees-cfm-and-boeing-update-software-design/ https://aerospaceglobalnews.com/news/bird-strike-incident-se... Why FAA and EASA didn't require any procedure changes in the interim to prevent the issue is a very good question.
  - MBCook 2y ago
    Can they force an install? Or will it be a choice? I like Mentor Pilot and Air Disasters, so I know I’ve heard of a few where the problem that caused an accident was already known and a fix was available but the airline just chose not to do it because they had that option. Or it was scheduled but hadn’t been performed yet because it wasn’t thought to be that critical. Having the FAA mandate the fix seems like it would be a much better option.
    - V99 2y ago
      Yes the FAA can issue what are called Airworthiness Directives and require an issue be resolved in the timeframe and manner they specify. The timeframe could be anything, but common forms are like: - Within the next X (flight) hours or Y calendar days - You don't have to, but additional inspection needed every X hours or Y days until you do - At next annual inspection - Immediate/before flying again (usually called an Emergency AD)
xeonmc 2y ago
Could this also have been activated in the Jeju air crash from the initial bird strike?
- unsnap_biceps 2y ago
  According to wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeju_Air_Flight_2216#Aircraft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeju_Air_Flight_2216#Aircraft , Jeju was running different engines then listed in the video as impacted.
- alistairSH 2y ago
  IIRC, that was a 737-800 not a 737 MAX 8.
- berkut 2y ago
  No, that aircraft was a 737-800 (NG), whereas the LRD is only on the LEAP engines of the 737 MAX...
exabrial 2y ago
[flagged]
- nottorp 2y ago
  No, it's because they blamed an undocumented system that killed two plane loads of people on pilot error... Also because later they were caught forgetting to screw down things... see that lost door. There's about zero trust in Boeing.
  - wobfan 2y ago
    > No, it's because they blamed an undocumented system that killed two plane loads of people on pilot error... And kept hiding and sabotaging the court process against them to hide that they and their pilots knew, even before the first crash, that this might happen. Like, I don't think Russia or anyone else did even have to do anything at all here, if they would've had any reason to. Boeing fucked up themselves.
- greggsy 2y ago
  Boeing has been in the media for a variety of corporate misconduct reasons, and the court cases were held in the US, which attracts the attention of the American media, which is a self-amplifying echo chamber which global consequences. I don’t doubt there were similar Airbus cases, but to suggest that the redirected attention is wholly due to an interference campaign is a bit far fetched in my opinion.
  - sho_hn 2y ago
    These are the most comparable times in the history of Airbus: https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/one-hundred-seconds-of-confusion-the-crash-of-china-airlines-flight-140-a9f60fee710d https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/one-hundred-seconds-of-c... https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/thinking-like-a-computer-the-crash-of-indian-airlines-flight-605-770758d374b9 https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/thinking-like-a-computer... Unlike with Boeing they didn't feature intentional obfuscation and fraud, but very similar themes of the airplane's software model of what's going on diverging from the pilots' and resulting in disaster. Along with stories like the Therac-25, this is one of my "favorite" engineering stories relevant to my profession.
dehrmann 2y ago
tl;dw: when a particular engine design used by the 737 MAX (but also other Boeing and Airbus planes) ingests a bird, if there's enough damage, it starts burning oil before the cabin bleed air intake. The cockpit and cabin have air supplied from different engines. Since the cockpit is relatively small, if the cockpit engine was damaged, smoke would fill the cockpit quickly, reducing the pilots' visibility and requiring them to don air masks. Bird strikes only happen at takeoff and landing--times when pilots don't have time to be fiddling with masks and seeing through smoke and trying to shut off the damaged engine. Regulators in the US and EU don't seem especially concerned.
- beAbU 2y ago
  >Regulators in the US and EU don't seem especially concerned Presumably because a bird strike at TO would prompt an immediate go-around and land. With landings the runway is right there. Not an aviation expert at all, so I am talking out of my ass on this.
  - agsnu 2y ago
    Doesn't help you if the pilot flying is incapacitated by the toxic air in less than a minute, or crash in to mountains, as in the scenario posited in the video. Climbing out to an appropriate height to join the approach, reconfiguring the plane for landing etc, takes several minutes; an immediate forced 180 teardrop back to land is very challenging to execute successfully (see the tragedy at Jeju just before new year).
    - rounce 2y ago
      They don’t have to be incapacitated, simply having to deal with reduced cockpit visibility and/or minor impairment during an emergency while in a critical phase of flight is a significant elevation of risk.
- db48x 2y ago
  It’s not actually burning the oil, just dumping it into the airstream in the form of tiny droplets. Some of that gets sucked up by the bleed air system, the rest continues on to the combustion chambers to be burned.
pxeger1 2y ago
This guy says he doesn’t understand why the issue isn’t taken more seriously, and that he’s tried to cover every possible hole in his logic. Here’s a possible reason: None of the sources he references about the danger of the smoke itself appear to be very confident that it genuinely could kill you in 39 seconds, and they all seem to be from sites that likely have an incentive to sensationalise. Maybe he had better sources for that claim, but didn’t show them (or maybe I didn’t watch the video carefully enough), but I wasn’t convinced that it’s actually true. But if not, It’s possible the FAA/Boeing have better data or other reasoning that makes them sure that the smoke is not that dangerous. In which case their inaction (but not necessarily their PR strategy...) seems more justifiable.
- beAbU 2y ago
  Or... Alternatively... This YouTube video is incentivised to sensationalise as well. It is on YouTube after all, and there is an algorithm to please.
  - lupusreal 2y ago
    I haven't watched this channel recently, but from what I saw I the past he seems to have a bias of reassuring the public that air travel is safe and problems are uncommon and usually not as bad as they might seem to the uninitiated. E.g. airline mechanics on the wing applying "duct tape" is normal, not shoddy maintenance.
    - gus_massa 2y ago
      I agree. I was going to write a similar comment. The guy is slightly in the "FAA is always right" camp, so I got surprised that he disagree now. He must be really worried.
- mrob 2y ago
  Even if it doesn't kill them, thick smoke in the cockpit is obviously going to impair pilot performance, and that's a big problem when it's most likely to happen during the most dangerous phases of flight (takeoff and landing) when they already have a lot to deal with. It seems strange to ignore it when the risk could be mitigated with a simple change of procedures.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
DrNosferatu 2y ago
Fascinating how many people had to actively shove this to the side so that it became potentially life threatening: - CFM designed an engine that, in certain emergencies, dumps oil into the quite possible (actually traditional, if I understand correctly?) human-breathing stream of the aircraft, apparently, without the relevant human-breathing system shutdown mandate when said (or any) emergency system is triggered; [truth be told, we never heard their complete story] - Boeing integrating said new engines into their new 737MAX without appropriately checking for possible new emergency mode interactions with their life-support (in this case, breathing) systems. - FAA dropped the ball upon accident investigation; - FAA removed their employee that then picked up the ball; - EASA swallowing what they were told by FAA without asking further questions; Well... I have worked in many no-harm potential software projects that employed more careful engineering than this. All hardware projects I worked on employed more careful engineering than this. Conclusion: It becomes more and more difficult to falsify that Boeing, nowadays, simply abandoned engineering design reviews, and, relies solely on some blend of "agile" methods to design people-carrying airplanes.

242 points by dz0ny 2y ago

One more reason not to fly Ryanair!

This is a issue that may also affect Airbus aircraft, but so far, it has only caused problems on two Boeing planes. Like MCAS, it was not disclosed to pilots, prompting the FAA to recommend design changes and notify flight crews. https://simpleflying.com/boeing-cfm-international-update-737-max-software-keep-smoke-entering-cockpit-after-2-bird-strikes/ https://simpleflying.com/boeing-cfm-international-update-737...

K0balt 2y ago
Unfortunately, it seems that the internal FAA recommendations were not allowed to make their way into any kind of airworthiness directive. The recommendations include very basic procedure changes that mitigate the near term risks without any significant impact to operation, as well as recommendations for what probably amounts to a software change and upgrades to some of the pilot oxygen masks to effect a permanent fix. The only reason that we even know about the internal recommendations is that they were leaked to the press. Boeing released a pilot bulletin that basically says to go through the checklist quickly and to treat smoke in the cabin as a major failure, but stops short of recommending some very, very simple steps in aircraft configuration prior to takeoff that would completely mitigate the issue without negatively effecting flight performance. The major recommendation in the internal FAA bulletin is to use the APU bleed instead of the main engine bleed air to power the air conditioning and cabin pressurisation during the takeoff phase of flight, below 3000 feet AGL. I can see no reason to drag feet on this recommendation, other than the uncomfortable suggestion that perhaps this issue should have been addressed during certification. (It is yet another difference from older 737 design , like the deadly MCAS system, that was not disclosed to pilots transitioning to the new aircraft)
- db48x 2y ago
  > […] stops short of recommending some very, very simple steps in aircraft configuration prior to takeoff that would completely mitigate the issue […] Well, the configuration changes during takeoff mitigate the issue if it happens during takeoff. If it happens at any other time then they don’t do anything to help. > I can see no reason to drag feet on this recommendation […] I can. Perhaps the FAA believes that it is better to minimize change fatigue. Since the problem can apparently be fixed in software, and Boeing has decided to make that fix, they might want to write just one airworthiness directive requiring everyone to install it instead of two, one telling pilots to adopt some procedure followed by another telling them to abandon it. > (It is yet another difference from older 737 design , like the deadly MCAS system, that was not disclosed to pilots transitioning to the new aircraft) Keep in mind that for most aircraft the airline can pick and choose between different engines. The pilots don’t have to learn the myriad different engineering decisions that go into those engines; from the pilot’s perspective they are supposed to be interchangeable.
  - garaetjjte 2y ago
    >Perhaps the FAA believes that it is better to minimize change fatigue. Additionally you might want to avoid the association that specific pack supplies air to the cockpit, as it varies across generations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kegworth_air_disaster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kegworth_air_disaster
    - db48x 2y ago
      Oooh, that’s rough.
  - karavelov 2y ago
    > Well, the configuration changes during takeoff mitigate the issue if it happens during takeoff. If it happens at any other time then they don’t do anything to help. There are no birds at higher altitudes
    - db48x 2y ago
berkut 2y ago
It's not clear that is does affect Airbus does it? It looks like only the LEAP-1b engines are affected by this, and I was under the impression that LEAP-1b was 737-MAX-only? (A320 has LEAP-1a as far as I can see).
- unsnap_biceps 2y ago
  he covers this in the video, but both engines have the same LRD (Load reduction device), but it's more about how the bleed system is done on if it's an impact or not, and he doesn't know if the other planes have the same flaw or not.
- fransje26 2y ago
  From [1], it looks like the 737 flight deck ventilation bypasses the mix manifold. This does not seem to be the case for the A320 family of jets. [2] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAy_ch6sfOQ&t=1707s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAy_ch6sfOQ&t=1707s [2] https://youtu.be/4Yf-0_UTbRs?feature=shared&t=311 https://youtu.be/4Yf-0_UTbRs?feature=shared&t=311 https://youtu.be/4Yf-0_UTbRs?feature=shared&t=311 https://youtu.be/4Yf-0_UTbRs?feature=shared&t=311
mercutio2 2y ago
Of course MCAS was disclosed to pilots, the idea that it wasn’t is ridiculous to the point of absurdity. Boeing has gone off the rails, but the general lack of nuance in the common narrative about their failures is really over the top. MCAS is how a fundamentally different plane behaves (in most cases) like a normal 737. The fact that such a system exists is described, and disclosed, in minute detail to pilots when they get their mandatory training on the 737-MAX. The specific name wasn’t used in the training, and that’s where this ridiculous narrative came from.
- cameldrv 2y ago
  The manual described Elevator Feel Shift, Speed Trim, and Stall Management Yaw Damper. It describes the scenarios in which each of these systems activate and what effect they have. MCAS uses the same hardware but has different scenarios in which it activates and has a different effect. Not knowing of the existence of MCAS and not having a viable procedure to deactivate it if it went haywire was critical to the two accidents. I've looked into this a lot and to my knowledge this was never disclosed to pilots. Can you provide a reference to MCAS being disclosed prior to the two accidents?

toomuchtodo 2y ago

“Load reduction device.” https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1497965 https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1497965

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

hypothesis 2y ago

I wonder what was the thought process there: hey we save an engine maybe, but everyone inside the plane gets cooked in 39 seconds. Ship it! Comments on that youtube video are filled with industry insiders and it’s just wild. They even think someone has died from a similar fuming event back in December…

Havoc 2y ago
Maybe they were thinking the Russian solution. If it crashes fast enough nobody finds out what happened
K0balt 2y ago
It doesn’t save the engine, it keeps it from ripping the wing off. It’s a good system. The part about filling the cabin with smoke because they couldn’t be bothered to make the software that detects the extreme vibration tell the AC units from that engine to shut down (which they already do if the rpm drops, indicating an engine failure-just not soon enough or reliable enough to prevent the smoke issue) - not so much. The system for the ECU to detect the engine mount failure condition already exists. The function to shut down the air handlers in response to a different indicator of engine failure already exists in the ECU. It’s just literally “also shut down if the engine mounts fail”, but the guys that sit around and think about the what ifs were given early retirement to make room for more MBAs.
- hypothesis 2y ago
  > It doesn’t save the engine, it keeps it from ripping the wing off. It’s a good system. Sure, I get that it was added to prevent plane from disintegrating, but like you said integration thinking is gone and now we have those individual components that sure look homicidal from outside. The other issue is that regulators are missing in action or worse. It’s no way to run the industry by relying on concerned youtubers..
  - K0balt 2y ago
    I’m with you on all of this. It’s like all of the grownups left the building and the inmates are running the asylum. Frikken clown world hijinks.

MobiusHorizons 2y ago

I found this to be a fascinating dive into a potentially serious safety concern. I was impressed how simple the mitigations could be based on the recommendations in the report. I find the evidence credible for an attempt to burry the issue, but honestly I don't understand the motivation. At this stage I feel Boeing and the FAA could really stand to gain some good press from being extra proactive about such issues. Especially when the proposed mitigations seem like they would be relatively easy to implement, and should not be expensive for airlines from what I can see. It seems like the source being the engine manufacturer and consequently having the potential of affecting other jets including potentially the airbus A320 would only improve the incentives for Boeing to get out ahead of this, and demonstrate a safety culture. Does anyone understand the motivations that could lead to the response we have seen from the FAA and Boeing?

apical_dendrite 2y ago
From what I've read, CFM and Boeing committed back in December to making the software fix that's suggested in the video. https://aerospaceglobalnews.com/news/bird-strike-incident-sees-cfm-and-boeing-update-software-design/ https://aerospaceglobalnews.com/news/bird-strike-incident-se... Why FAA and EASA didn't require any procedure changes in the interim to prevent the issue is a very good question.
- MBCook 2y ago
  Can they force an install? Or will it be a choice? I like Mentor Pilot and Air Disasters, so I know I’ve heard of a few where the problem that caused an accident was already known and a fix was available but the airline just chose not to do it because they had that option. Or it was scheduled but hadn’t been performed yet because it wasn’t thought to be that critical. Having the FAA mandate the fix seems like it would be a much better option.
  - V99 2y ago
    Yes the FAA can issue what are called Airworthiness Directives and require an issue be resolved in the timeframe and manner they specify. The timeframe could be anything, but common forms are like: - Within the next X (flight) hours or Y calendar days - You don't have to, but additional inspection needed every X hours or Y days until you do - At next annual inspection - Immediate/before flying again (usually called an Emergency AD)

xeonmc 2y ago

Could this also have been activated in the Jeju air crash from the initial bird strike?

unsnap_biceps 2y ago
According to wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeju_Air_Flight_2216#Aircraft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeju_Air_Flight_2216#Aircraft , Jeju was running different engines then listed in the video as impacted.
alistairSH 2y ago
IIRC, that was a 737-800 not a 737 MAX 8.
berkut 2y ago
No, that aircraft was a 737-800 (NG), whereas the LRD is only on the LEAP engines of the 737 MAX...

exabrial 2y ago

[flagged]

nottorp 2y ago
No, it's because they blamed an undocumented system that killed two plane loads of people on pilot error... Also because later they were caught forgetting to screw down things... see that lost door. There's about zero trust in Boeing.
- wobfan 2y ago
  > No, it's because they blamed an undocumented system that killed two plane loads of people on pilot error... And kept hiding and sabotaging the court process against them to hide that they and their pilots knew, even before the first crash, that this might happen. Like, I don't think Russia or anyone else did even have to do anything at all here, if they would've had any reason to. Boeing fucked up themselves.
greggsy 2y ago
Boeing has been in the media for a variety of corporate misconduct reasons, and the court cases were held in the US, which attracts the attention of the American media, which is a self-amplifying echo chamber which global consequences. I don’t doubt there were similar Airbus cases, but to suggest that the redirected attention is wholly due to an interference campaign is a bit far fetched in my opinion.
- sho_hn 2y ago
  These are the most comparable times in the history of Airbus: https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/one-hundred-seconds-of-confusion-the-crash-of-china-airlines-flight-140-a9f60fee710d https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/one-hundred-seconds-of-c... https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/thinking-like-a-computer-the-crash-of-indian-airlines-flight-605-770758d374b9 https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/thinking-like-a-computer... Unlike with Boeing they didn't feature intentional obfuscation and fraud, but very similar themes of the airplane's software model of what's going on diverging from the pilots' and resulting in disaster. Along with stories like the Therac-25, this is one of my "favorite" engineering stories relevant to my profession.

dehrmann 2y ago

tl;dw: when a particular engine design used by the 737 MAX (but also other Boeing and Airbus planes) ingests a bird, if there's enough damage, it starts burning oil before the cabin bleed air intake. The cockpit and cabin have air supplied from different engines. Since the cockpit is relatively small, if the cockpit engine was damaged, smoke would fill the cockpit quickly, reducing the pilots' visibility and requiring them to don air masks. Bird strikes only happen at takeoff and landing--times when pilots don't have time to be fiddling with masks and seeing through smoke and trying to shut off the damaged engine. Regulators in the US and EU don't seem especially concerned.

beAbU 2y ago
>Regulators in the US and EU don't seem especially concerned Presumably because a bird strike at TO would prompt an immediate go-around and land. With landings the runway is right there. Not an aviation expert at all, so I am talking out of my ass on this.
- agsnu 2y ago
  Doesn't help you if the pilot flying is incapacitated by the toxic air in less than a minute, or crash in to mountains, as in the scenario posited in the video. Climbing out to an appropriate height to join the approach, reconfiguring the plane for landing etc, takes several minutes; an immediate forced 180 teardrop back to land is very challenging to execute successfully (see the tragedy at Jeju just before new year).
  - rounce 2y ago
    They don’t have to be incapacitated, simply having to deal with reduced cockpit visibility and/or minor impairment during an emergency while in a critical phase of flight is a significant elevation of risk.
db48x 2y ago
It’s not actually burning the oil, just dumping it into the airstream in the form of tiny droplets. Some of that gets sucked up by the bleed air system, the rest continues on to the combustion chambers to be burned.

pxeger1 2y ago

This guy says he doesn’t understand why the issue isn’t taken more seriously, and that he’s tried to cover every possible hole in his logic. Here’s a possible reason: None of the sources he references about the danger of the smoke itself appear to be very confident that it genuinely could kill you in 39 seconds, and they all seem to be from sites that likely have an incentive to sensationalise. Maybe he had better sources for that claim, but didn’t show them (or maybe I didn’t watch the video carefully enough), but I wasn’t convinced that it’s actually true. But if not, It’s possible the FAA/Boeing have better data or other reasoning that makes them sure that the smoke is not that dangerous. In which case their inaction (but not necessarily their PR strategy...) seems more justifiable.

beAbU 2y ago
Or... Alternatively... This YouTube video is incentivised to sensationalise as well. It is on YouTube after all, and there is an algorithm to please.
- lupusreal 2y ago
  I haven't watched this channel recently, but from what I saw I the past he seems to have a bias of reassuring the public that air travel is safe and problems are uncommon and usually not as bad as they might seem to the uninitiated. E.g. airline mechanics on the wing applying "duct tape" is normal, not shoddy maintenance.
  - gus_massa 2y ago
    I agree. I was going to write a similar comment. The guy is slightly in the "FAA is always right" camp, so I got surprised that he disagree now. He must be really worried.
mrob 2y ago
Even if it doesn't kill them, thick smoke in the cockpit is obviously going to impair pilot performance, and that's a big problem when it's most likely to happen during the most dangerous phases of flight (takeoff and landing) when they already have a lot to deal with. It seems strange to ignore it when the risk could be mitigated with a simple change of procedures.

deleted 2y ago

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DrNosferatu 2y ago

Fascinating how many people had to actively shove this to the side so that it became potentially life threatening: - CFM designed an engine that, in certain emergencies, dumps oil into the quite possible (actually traditional, if I understand correctly?) human-breathing stream of the aircraft, apparently, without the relevant human-breathing system shutdown mandate when said (or any) emergency system is triggered; [truth be told, we never heard their complete story] - Boeing integrating said new engines into their new 737MAX without appropriately checking for possible new emergency mode interactions with their life-support (in this case, breathing) systems. - FAA dropped the ball upon accident investigation; - FAA removed their employee that then picked up the ball; - EASA swallowing what they were told by FAA without asking further questions; Well... I have worked in many no-harm potential software projects that employed more careful engineering than this. All hardware projects I worked on employed more careful engineering than this. Conclusion: It becomes more and more difficult to falsify that Boeing, nowadays, simply abandoned engineering design reviews, and, relies solely on some blend of "agile" methods to design people-carrying airplanes.