10 hours ago, Chock said:

 

The 737 MAX is an old airframe design which they've tried to shoehorn too large a diameter engine onto, in an attempt to circumvent the costs of developing a new airframe to try and keep up with Airbus 

 

Precisely! Mr Chock is spot on. It was a dumb idea to begin with. In my view, regardless of the "fixes" they attempt to apply, it will always be a compromised design. 

 

As this thread clearly shows, there are many people who do not trust the MAX anymore, regardless of whether the plane is now actually safe or not. Combining that with the current situation of the entire aviation industry, I predict that Boeing will have a hard time selling this aircraft. If Boeing does not react quickly and builds a more modern mid-range airplane, it will leave the market to Airbus and potentially Chinese and Russian manufacturers (at least on the Asian market). I think the only thing that prevents Boeing from heading for bankruptcy is their military products.

Peter

On 10/16/2020 at 1:36 PM, overspeed3 said:

Fly aboard the Max, or get a Covid19 vaccine shot?

Max flight anyday.!!.. I haven't had much opprotunity (funds) to go on flights for many years so of course I'm going to take that option..assuming it would be free!  Well the vaccine will apparently be free so equal playing field.. I have reasons for not wanting that vaccine, but we cannot do politics, and my post would certainly get deleted.

 

Lord knows I've been critical of Boeing for this fiasco.  They should have developed a brand new replacement for the 737.  It would have cost more up front, but in the long run it would have paid off IMO.  Instead they chose to essentially retrofit an old design to make it more fuel efficient and tried to call it a new airplane.  Hopefully the company has learned a lesson here.  Time will tell.

Having said that, I'm pretty confident that the 737 MAX is now a very safe airplane.

Dave

 

 

On 10/17/2020 at 12:45 AM, Chock said:

Yeah right, and Titanic was unsinkable too.

That 'can't happen again' claim is similar to [...]

On 10/17/2020 at 2:01 AM, W2DR said:

Wanna buy a bridge?

Well... what I said was that an accident like the ones that happened, with MCAS essentially driving the plane into the ground by resetting and applying far too much stab trim while relying on one data source, can't happen again because it's, like I said, plain impossible with the updated MCAS design. That's not just a claim or me believing anything, it's a fact and if it wasn't, we wouldn't be looking at re-certification right now but scrapping instead.

Edited October 18, 20205 yr by threegreen
10 minute time frame for repeated MCAS activation was incorrect.

On 10/17/2020 at 6:37 AM, killthespam said:

You don't know what you are talking about in this case.

This airplane was designed with a software flaw in MCAS system. Boeing did not provide enough information on manuals or training for the pilots.

After the crash Boeing issued a bulletin regarding MCAS and instructed the airlines to train the pilots to use a checklist to help them in the case of uncontrolled stabilizer movement.

There is a podcast in which two former NTSB investigators read from the FDR and CVR data of the Lion Air flight. The pilots figured out how to stop the stab trim movements by re-lowering the flaps after which MCAS was active only for the last minute of the 10 minute flight. The rest was a case of unreliable left side instruments with right side and standby instruments working. The crew however never activated their abnormals response, neither of the pilots knew the stab trim runaway or unreliable airspeed memory items and couldn't find the checklist in the QRH after several minutes of searching, there was virtually no CRM or communication between the crew. The Captain never told the First Officer what he had done to stop the trim movements or what was going on, while both were following ATC instructions instead of requesting a block altitude or a holding to troubleshoot. All this was while MCAS was disabled and the aircraft leveled off and under full control.

There is no doubt that Boeing and in part the FAA are to blame for all this and that a terrible MCAS design ultimately brought down this aircraft. But this was not the competent and well-trained flight crew you would expect in the cockpit of the airliner you're boarding.

Before anyone jumps on me, I'm just saying what the podcast and the flight data say and I'm not blaming the pilots for the crash. In case anyone's interested in the full thing: https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-w9bnw-cfcd9b?utm_campaign=u_share_ep&utm_medium=dlink&utm_source=u_share

Not only has the software been updated, a physical modification to the wire bundle at the stab trim needs to be carried out before the aircraft can re enter service. After everything that has happened since the MAX grounding, from aircraft re-engineering, certification and pilot training I will not even give getting on one a second thought as it will probably be the safest aircraft in the sky.

6 hours ago, threegreen said:

There is a podcast in which two former NTSB investigators read from the FDR and CVR data of the Lion Air flight. The pilots figured out how to stop the stab trim movements by re-lowering the flaps after which MCAS was active only for the last minute of the 10 minute flight. The rest was a case of unreliable left side instruments with right side and standby instruments working. The crew however never activated their abnormals response, neither of the pilots knew the stab trim runaway or unreliable airspeed memory items and couldn't find the checklist in the QRH after several minutes of searching, there was virtually no CRM or communication between the crew. The Captain never told the First Officer what he had done to stop the trim movements or what was going on, while both were following ATC instructions instead of requesting a block altitude or a holding to troubleshoot. All this was while MCAS was disabled and the aircraft leveled off and under full control.

There is no doubt that Boeing and in part the FAA are to blame for all this and that a terrible MCAS design ultimately brought down this aircraft. But this was not the competent and well-trained flight crew you would expect in the cockpit of the airliner you're boarding.

Before anyone jumps on me, I'm just saying what the podcast and the flight data say and I'm not blaming the pilots for the crash. In case anyone's interested in the full thing: https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-w9bnw-cfcd9b?utm_campaign=u_share_ep&utm_medium=dlink&utm_source=u_share

You see, the problem is very complicated and full of experts like these two "Flight safety Detectives" that just speculate, not working anymore with the agency and spreading wrong information.

Even for the actual/current NTSB investigators, they need special clearance to read the FDR and CVR, especially in cases of this magnitude.

What is available to the public is a different version.

Before the crash of the Lion Air (first crash), the MCAS system was not even explained (if at all) to the airlines and the pilots were not even trained for that event or had an emergency checklist available for that scenario to follow.

If you pay attention these two clowns accuse the pilots of "Flight crew did not follow procedures"

After the crash, and preliminary investigation Boeing issued a bulletin regarding training and a new emergency checklist to address the issue.

So, coming back to my accusations of these two experts, which procedures pilots were to follow when this system was not explained in the ground schools, simulator and no checklist was issued to any airline?

Obviously, you are not a pilot and you take it as it is and not sensitive to these kinds of issues.

We (the pilots) dig into these unfortunate situations very deep because we want to learn and understand what happened and find it very offensive when "experts" like them voice and speculate a scenario like this.

The unfortunate truth is that the balance tips more towards the human error (Manufacturer, authorities, airlines, training and the last one is sadly us the pilots).

This is part of the findings:

Following the accident Boeing issued flight crew Operation Manual Bulletin (OMB) that emphasize the procedure of runaway stabilizer in the case of uncommanded nose down stabilizer trim due to erroneous AOA. This was a trained flight crew memory item in 737-NG which could have been an option available to the flight crew. However, the procedure was not reintroduced during transition training and there was no immediate indication available to the flight crew to be able to directly correlate the uncommanded nose down stabilizer to the procedure. Therefore, the assumption of relying on trained crew procedures, to implement memory items was inappropriate.

Decision to not Include Description in FCOM or Differences Training Boeing and the FAA engaged in extensive discussion about the appropriate content of Boeing 737-8 (MAX) training and manuals for a period of several years prior to Boeing 737-8 (MAX) certification. During discussions and communications with the FAA beginning in March 2016, Boeing proposed removing MCAS from the FCOM and differences tables. The supporting rationale was discussed between Boeing and FAA and accepted by FAA, but not formally documented in meeting minutes. Specifically, 14 FAR 25.1585 (b) states that “Information or procedures not directly related to airworthiness or not under the control of the crew must not be included, nor must any procedure that is accepted as basic airmanship.” Boeing considered that MCAS function is automatic, without any control input from the flight crew and that it would operate in the background. Boeing also considered that the procedure required to respond to any MCAS function was no different than the existing procedures and that crews were not expected to encounter MCAS in normal operation. The discussions did not consider the failure scenario seen on the accident flight.

 

Edited October 19, 20205 yr by killthespam
...

15 hours ago, killthespam said:

You see, the problem is very complicated and full of experts like these two "Flight safety Detectives" that just speculate, not working anymore with the agency and spreading wrong information.

Those flight safety ditectives most likely have THOUSANDS of more hours dissecting these types of events then you do. Whether you’re a pilot or not, it’s obvious you have made up your mind and won’t even entertain anything else. Also, just because you’re a pilot doesn’t mean you have ANY clue as to how these accidents happened let alone investigate an accident. You’re entitled to your own opinion though. However, as a pilot in the industry and a check airman for my airline, I’m going to believe Greg Feith who has worked extensively on other part 121 air crash investigations to pick apart the first accident and give his insight over some user on avsim who feels the need to play the riteous “I’m a pilot And I know everything” card. 
 

I myself and another tried to give you another view point of these situations but you implied that I was some cold blooded killer by even insinuating that the pilots had some level of culpability for the first accident. Come on man...

Edited October 19, 20205 yr by n4gix
Removed unnecessary long quote!

Thank you for the wise words.

7 hours ago, ahsmatt7 said:

Those flight safety ditectives most likely have THOUSANDS of more hours dissecting these types of events

Goglia and Feith both have very impressive credentials. What you do not know is whether or not one of them and/or both are consulting for Boeing`s civil liability insurers. It sounds to me that they are attempting to make the case for the contributory negligence of third parties in public forums because Boeing's civil liability insurers are worried about not being capable of making that case in a legal forum.

 

. 

 

Edited October 19, 20205 yr by CYXR

16 hours ago, killthespam said:

You see, the problem is very complicated and full of experts like these two "Flight safety Detectives" that just speculate, not working anymore with the agency and spreading wrong information.

Even for the actual/current NTSB investigators, they need special clearance to read the FDR and CVR, especially in cases of this magnitude.

What is available to the public is a different version.

If you pay attention these two clowns accuse the pilots of "Flight crew did not follow procedures"

After the crash, and preliminary investigation Boeing issued a bulletin regarding training and a new emergency checklist to address the issue.

So, coming back to my accusations of these two experts, which procedures pilots were to follow when this system was not explained in the ground schools, simulator and no checklist was issued to any airline?

[...]

I hear you. But I also think we are on the wrong path when professional pilots who also happen to have the experience of decades of investigating accidents are called speculating "clowns". If you denounce people like that to being false experts spreading wrong information I'm wondering what you think the word expert means, because people like that are the very definition of it.

I'm also wondering what kind of insider knowledge you have that you can say what they're reading from is a different version that somehow tells another story than the other one. Why would the investigation publish data which differs from what actually happened?

The conclusion here is that no matter whether recoverable or not, this crew didn't appear to be prepared for any emergency, which is why I think it's fair and even important to talk about the pilot's role in the accident. After all, the crew that flew the aircraft on the flight before were able to deal with the same situation, so the question is whether this crew might have had a chance as well with a better response. I don't think this question has to be an attempt to twist things in Boeing's favor. The official investigation report of the accident lists pilot error as one factor leading to the crash by the way.

Edited October 19, 20205 yr by threegreen

If I was to time travel back to 1970 and they were to ask me what the future of aviation was like? What a big let down that would be for them:

Can you travel from London to Sydney in 2 hours??? no

What replaced the Concord??? Nothing it retired we are still flying in jets

So what is the biggest selling jets then??? The B737, but it is grounded, well you see they tried to put this computer on it and well, never mind 🤣

6 hours ago, threegreen said:

I hear you. But I also think we are on the wrong path when professional pilots who also happen to have the experience of decades of investigating accidents are called speculating "clowns". If you denounce people like that to being false experts spreading wrong information I'm wondering what you think the word expert means, because people like that are the very definition of it.

I'm also wondering what kind of insider knowledge you have that you can say what they're reading from is a different version that somehow tells another story than the other one. Why would the investigation publish data which differs from what actually happened?

The conclusion here is that no matter whether recoverable or not, this crew didn't appear to be prepared for any emergency, which is why I think it's fair and even important to talk about the pilot's role in the accident. After all, the crew that flew the aircraft on the flight before were able to deal with the same situation, so the question is whether this crew might have had a chance as well with a better response. I don't think this question has to be an attempt to twist things in Boeing's favor. The official investigation report of the accident lists pilot error as one factor leading to the crash by the way.

Well, before they retired they were very good at it.

After that, they don't have the same access and the whole picture as ones that are current and qualified at NTSB.

Having said that like in the case of Lion air it's not the first time when they made wrong statements ( whatever is the reason) as to "Flight crew did not follow procedures", broad and empty statement.

 

As I mentioned, at that time of the accident Boeing did not have any training or procedures for this scenario, and the system was not mentioned in the FCOM because it was not required by the 14 FAR 25. So which procedure they were to follow when there had none at that time for their unfortunate problem?

 

 

14 FAR 25.1585 (b) states that “Information or procedures not directly related to airworthiness or not under the control of the crew must not be included, nor must any procedure that is accepted as basic airmanship.”

 

So when you rightfully say that the other crew did not have an issue with it you are correct, they just got lucky!

 

It was not skills or anything else, just happened that way.

 

Unfortunately, if you see their training folder there is a lot of "disappointment" about the qualifications even each one of them had about 5000 total flight time or so.

 

For me, it is very upsetting to see their kind of unfounded accusations"Flight crew did not follow procedures" especially when so many people died and no emergency checklist was published.

 

Yes, they were professionals but not anymore, they are retired and not current. They need to enjoy retirement and not to speculate anymore.

 

This is way too much already.

On 10/20/2020 at 1:21 AM, killthespam said:

Well, before they retired they were very good at it.

 

So which procedure they were to follow when there had none at that time for their unfortunate problem?

They don't lose their skill and experience just because they are retired. I don't think the data they read from is some 'light version' of the real one which happens to tell a different story than the real one, so if these two read from it as they've done during I don't know how many investigations I'm inclined to say there's something to their conclusion.

They aren't talking about not following some kind of MCAS procedure or the one that Boeing published after the Lion Air crash, which by the way is nothing more than the stab trim runaway checklist that every pilot knows. When they say the crew didn't follow procedures they are talking about virtually no CRM or general communication, calling for unreliable airspeed memory items and then not executing those, following ATC instead of going standby to deal with the situation and some more. Have you listened to the podcast?

On 10/20/2020 at 1:21 AM, killthespam said:

So when you rightfully say that the other crew did not have an issue with it you are correct, they just got lucky!

 

It was not skills or anything else, just happened that way.

They recognized a stab trim runaway and executed the related memory items and used the stab trim cutout switches to turn the thing off, following the procedure. What about that is luck or a lack of skill? It was a crew that knew how to deal with it, even in a situation of confusion and stress. That's just good piloting.