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0 pointsbronson6y ago0 comments

You hype up reliance on US pilot training, but ignore Boeing's intent to NOT train pilots on MCAS (and especially its differences from existing behavior). Plenty of US pilots have gone on record saying that their US-based MAX-8 training left them unprepared to fly the MAX-8 as it was originally delivered.

In fact, even the Southwest pilots you mention disagree with you: https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/in-sc...

You're still trying really hard to blame the pilots and ignore critical and unarguable airframe deficiencies. It hasn't worked yet but maybe if you keep writing lots and lots of words you'll get somewhere.

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privateSFacct6y ago

And despite no training we have what may have been some amazingly good MCAS recoveries within the US during takeoff into things like turbulence triggered MCAS nosedowns - pilots thought their own fault / couldn't understand what was going on but the limited reports in terms of response are great for totally untrained situations. I'm sure pilots were pissed, they should be!

I think you are failing to understand how the chain of safety works. Ideally you have a great design. If you don't then ideally the flaws / weaknesses don't get hit because you have things like good maintenance. If you don't have that then maybe next hope is the pilots. Worst case you then you require instrumentation to help reduce risk of the next tragedy. Etc.

This system has resulted in an incredibly safe mode of transport despite many challenges / crazy tolerances etc.

bronsonOP6y ago

"Amazingly good MCAS recoveries" are a crew success, yes, but they are even more a sign of aircraft and regulatory failure. You aren't acknolwedging that the MAX-8 has serious issues no matter where the pilot learned to fly.

American pilots are top notch. However, the pilots themselves don't want to be put in the position of saving the aircraft, and a big part of the FAA's charter is to ensure that they don't have to.

Does your chain of safety include feeding a twitchy automated system from a single sensor?

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