{"id":176053,"date":"2020-09-17T18:19:00","date_gmt":"2020-09-17T23:19:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2020\/09\/17\/im-beginning-to-think-that-boeing-doesnt-want-to-make-planes\/"},"modified":"2020-09-17T18:19:00","modified_gmt":"2020-09-17T23:19:00","slug":"im-beginning-to-think-that-boeing-doesnt-want-to-make-planes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2020\/09\/17\/im-beginning-to-think-that-boeing-doesnt-want-to-make-planes\/","title":{"rendered":"I&#8217;m Beginning to Think That Boeing Doesn&#8217;t Want to Make Planes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It turns out that the problems with the 737 MAX and MCAS were patently obvious early in development in simulator tests, but <a href=\"https:\/\/aviationweek.com\/air-transport\/safety-ops-regulation\/early-simulator-trials-foreshadowed-boeing-737-max-pilot-issues\">Boeing ignored and actively covered up these problems<\/a>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>At this point, I think that we need to seriously consider filing criminal charges against senior figures at Boeing aircraft, and maybe a few FAA officials.<\/p>\n<p>Otherwise, the finance types will kill again:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">Six years before the crew flying a Lion Air Boeing 737-8 reacted  to an emergency in a very different way than Boeing assumed pilots  would, something similar happened within Boeing\u2019s walls.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">During simulator sessions to evaluate a new flight control law\u2019s  potential hazards, Boeing test pilots took more than 10 sec. to diagnose  and correct a runaway stabilizer. The session caused one employee to  wonder whether pilots of the newest 737 family member, dubbed the MAX  series for marketing purposes, needed more information to diagnose the  hazard. A second employee who flew the simulator scenario responded that  more analysis was needed.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">New U.S. Congress report highlights issues with pilot-aircraft interface during 737 MAX development<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">Long-accepted norms for predicting how pilots react are now being challenged<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">Boeing did not deem the issues significant risks and minimized how much information pilots received<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">Boeing ultimately determined that MAX pilots would  react within seconds in such scenarios\u2014and that the new control law, the  Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), could not  create new or more severe hazards. The assumptions were not challenged  by regulators.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">The similar accident sequences of Lion Air Flight 610 (JT610) in  October 2018 and Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 (ET302) less than five  months later\u2014both caused by unneeded MCAS activations\u2014showed that Boeing  and the FAA were wrong. Now Boeing, the FAA and others point to the  accidents as hard, painful evidence that generally accepted assumptions  used to evaluate how pilots will react during inflight emergencies need  revamping <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.aviationweek.com\/issue\/20191014#!&amp;pid=18\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">(<i>AW&amp;ST <\/i>Oct. 14-27, 2019, p. 18)<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">But newly revealed information collected by U.S. lawmakers  investigating the 737 MAX development raises questions about how Boeing  handled hazard assessments and whether it ignored evidence that showed  MAX pilots would need more help than they were given.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">\u201cMultiple Boeing [employees] failed to inform the FAA that Boeing had  discovered early on in the MAX program that it took one of its own test  pilots more than 10 sec. to respond to an uncommanded activation of  MCAS in a flight simulator, a condition the pilot found to be  \u2018catastrophic,\u2019\u201d states a report released by the House Transportation  and Infrastructure (T&amp;I) Committee. \u201cThis should have called into  question Boeing\u2019s assumptions about pilot response times. It did not.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">The committee\u2019s view is based in part on email messages about the  2012 simulator sessions included among thousands of pages of documents  Boeing and the FAA provided in response to lawmakers\u2019 requests during  the 18-month investigation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">In a second  run-through, \u201cthe reaction time was long,\u201d greater than 10 sec., the  employee wrote, before the cutout switches were toggled, stopping the  MCAS-triggered automatic nose-down inputs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">\u201cDo you think that with pilot training\/knowledge of the system there  will be a sufficiently quick response to the [stabilizer] runaway . . .  ?\u201d the employee asked.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">\u201cI would like to take a look at how much time there is between a  hazardous assessment and a catastrophic assessment,\u201d a second employee  responds.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">The T&amp;I Committee report does not explain what happened next.  Testifying before the committee in October 2019, former Boeing  Commercial Airplanes chief engineer John Hamilton told lawmakers that  subsequent simulator runaway-stabilizer scenarios showed \u201cthe typical  reaction time was 4 sec.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">Boeing also concluded that a reaction of 10 sec. or longer must be  categorized as \u201ccatastrophic,\u201d which the FAA\u2019s large aircraft system  design and analysis certification guidance defines as \u201cfailure  conditions which would prevent continued safe flight and landing.\u201d The  10-sec. parameter was listed in 737 MAX internal design parameters, or  \u201ccoordination sheets,\u201d right through the 737-8\u2019s March 2017  certification.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">\u201cEvery new buzzword represents a company and airline cost via changed  manuals, changed training, changed maintenance manuals,\u201d says a 2013  Boeing internal \u201cproblem statement\u201d document discussing how the MCAS  should be categorized. \u201cRecommended action: investigate deletion of MCAS  nomenclature and cover under \u2018revised speed trim.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">While the MCAS name did not disappear, it was downplayed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">A 2014 Boeing presentation prepared for Southwest Airlines and  included in the committee\u2019s report discusses the MCAS, underscoring that  the system was not kept a secret. But Boeing opted not to include it in  flight crew operations manuals, so most line pilots did not realize it  existed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">Meanwhile, Boeing determined that the MCAS\u2019 original authority was not enough.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">Developed in response to 2011 wind-tunnel testing that quantified the  effects of the MAX\u2019s CFM Leap 1B engines on the aircraft\u2019s aerodynamics  as a requirement to ensure the new model handled like its predecessors  in certain rare flight profiles, the MCAS\u2019 original authority covered  high-speed scenarios such as wind-up turns.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">Adding the low-speed authority meant that the MCAS could direct an  aircraft from wings-level to full aircraft nose down in two cycles or an  elapsed time of 25 sec., counting a 5-sec. pause between activations.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">The day before JT610 went down, a different crew flew the same aircraft and experienced a similar situation <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.aviationweek.com\/issue\/20191111#!&amp;pid=22\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">(<i>AW&amp;ST<\/i> Nov. 11-24, 2019, p. 23)<\/a>.  While the crew, aided by a pilot flying in the jumpseat, toggled the  stabilizer trim cutout switches and eventually landed safely, their  reaction did not match Boeing\u2019s assumptions. This flight and the two  accident flights are the only three in-service reports of the MCAS  triggering unneeded stabilizer inputs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/transportation.house.gov\/committee-activity\/boeing-737-max-investigation\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The T&amp;I Committee\u2019s 238-page report<\/a> cites Boeing\u2019s \u201cdisturbing pattern of technical miscalculations and  troubling management misjudgments\u201d as well as \u201cnumerous oversight lapses  and accountability gaps by the FAA\u201d as playing a \u201csignificant\u201d role in  the two accidents. The pilot-response issue is part of a long list that  includes designing the MCAS to be activated based on one AOA sensor\u2019s  input and deciding, with FAA approval, to keep any discussion of the  MCAS out of pilot flight manuals.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #2b00fe;\">\u201cOur report lays out disturbing revelations about how Boeing . . .  escaped scrutiny from the FAA, withheld critical information from  pilots, and ultimately put planes into service that killed 346 innocent  people,\u201d says committee Chair Pete DeFazio (D-Ore.). \u201cWhat\u2019s  particularly infuriating is how Boeing and FAA both gambled with public  safety in the critical time period between the two crashes.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>They knew.&nbsp; Their own pilots, who knew the plane like the back of their hands,&nbsp; could not reliably react in under 10 seconds.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It turns out that the problems with the 737 MAX and MCAS were patently obvious early in development in simulator tests, but Boeing ignored and actively covered up these problems.&nbsp; At this point, I think that we need to seriously consider filing criminal charges against senior figures at Boeing aircraft, and maybe a few FAA &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[384,365,368,588,548],"class_list":["post-176053","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-aviation","tag-business","tag-corruption","tag-fail","tag-safety"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176053"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176053"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176053\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}