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It really is. I can honestly say it’s been tantamount to being on uppers of some sort.
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They have fixed the plane, or at least, they think they have. They have a software fix for it. The FAA are not inclined to sign off on it so quickly, being super pissed that Boeing sneaked through major changes to how the plane flew while supposedly it was under the same type certificate. A few days ago the FAA were unusually scathing to Congress about the pressure they felt Boeing were putting them under:
According to an email sent by the FAA to the congressional aviation oversight committees, “the purpose of the meeting is to ensure Boeing is clear on FAA’s expectations regarding the ongoing review of the 737 MAX.”
“The Administrator is concerned that Boeing continues to pursue a return-to-service schedule that is not realistic,” the email says, adding that Dickson is more concerned with “the perception that some of Boeing’s public statements have been designed to force FAA into taking quicker action.”
Boeing’s announcement today would seem to be a reaction to this “fuck you” from the FAA.
If you’re not aware, what Boeing did with the 737 MAX was absolutely insane. Their MCAS flight control system, designed to cope with the weight-distribution change from the repositioned engines, read data from a single angle-of-attack sensor. If this sensor failed, the MCAS would issue nose-down commands which could not be overridden by the pilot. The only way to stop this is to completely disable automatic trim, a fairly radical step which is actually impossible under some flight conditions.
Boeing’s testing for the 737 MAX did not include a scenario of angle-of-attack sensor failure, but some employees did later figure out there might be a slight problem with a flight control system overriding the pilot based on a single sensor:
On October 30, the House made public a 2015 internal email discussion between Boeing employees raising concerns about MCAS design in the exact scenario blamed for the two crashes: “Are we vulnerable to single AOA sensor failures with the MCAS implementation?”. Committee members discussed another internal document, stating that a reaction longer than 10 seconds to an MCAS malfunction “found the failure to be catastrophic.”
They did not bring this up with the FAA, obviously. The chances of pilots reacting within 10 seconds might have been higher if they had even known MCAS existed. It’s not even mentioned in the pilot’s manual. This was a consequence of Boeing’s desire to give the 737 MAX the same type certification as the 737, meaning pilots can fly it without needing expensive retraining.
Basically Boeing are lucky the directors aren’t being fed to wild boars, the FAA are not in a mood to cooperate with them.
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That is absolutely insane. I honestly had no idea it was that bad. JFC.
I should mention that the 737 MAX is equipped with two angle-of-attack sensors, which is what allows Boeing to issue a software fix. The fix includes comparing data from both sensors as well as forbidding the MCAS from continuing to issue nose-down commands after the pilot corrects the initial one (in the crash incidents, after the pilot corrected the trim, the MCAS would just issue another nose-down command). But on the initial implementation, Boeing did not compare data from both sensors… because of reasons? Like they didn’t consider the MCAS critical to flight safety, basically, and because they never simulated an AoA sensor failure, they didn’t know how dangerous that scenario would be.
Also, there’s an “AoA DISAGREE” warning light on the dash, and not only did Boeing charge extra for this feature (because charging extra for warning lights is a cool business model) but it was later discovered that it wouldn’t work unless the AoA value display, yet another optional feature not ordered by most airlines, was also installed. The FAA may mandate that Boeing retrofit all existing 737 MAX with functional AoA Disagree warnings.
Boeing has been being run by mba’s instead of engineers for a while now and it is a shame…
Come play walrus with us instead.
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We should do a walrus with movie clips.
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imo Sopranos themed walrus with subtle categories that only you know
Oh man what an amazing feeling that must be. I’m very jealous.
Gif walrus
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Do it.
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Mebbe. I’d be willing to run it - after the Rivaldo, KofNY walrus is over.
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Happy to help with this or play if you run it
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Cool. Co-running probably. We’ll see how many people want to enter.
There should be a Darwin award for deer trying to cross a frozen lake
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How about for the people who die trying to save them?
They’re just trying to make themselves sexy to possible partners by saving cute animals, Darwin approves of such risks
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All to improve their chances to be fruitful and divide. Or is that multiply? Well, fortunately those mean the same thing in biology