
Airlines scour the world for scarce 737 Max simulators - hhs
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-boeing-737max-training/airlines-scour-the-world-for-scarce-737-max-simulators-idUSKBN1ZL0EH
======
thawaway1837
There’s some weird numbers in the article, which may either be a lost in
translation situation or more evidence that airlines and Boeing are once again
playing fast and loose with their plans.

For example, Southwest is apparently claiming they will be able to train their
10000 737 pilots on the simulator in 30 days. They have 3 simulators (still
going through certification) and have ordered another 3 for late 2020.

Assuming they have all 6 on day one, that means each simulator will be
training approximately 1600 pilots. Divided by 30 days, gives you 50 pilots a
day? In other words less than 30 minutes a pilot assuming extreme efficiency.
And training 24/7.

~~~
bonestamp2
I was surprised by that 10,000 pilot number. It seems huge until you look it
up and realize they have 752 planes. Each plane averages 6 flights/day. So
they have about 13 pilots per plane and an average of 2 pilots per flight. *Of
course, many of those flights are flown by the same pilots which gives them
coverage for the various shifts. The numbers are probably a little more off
now too since some of their fleet is idle. Either way, 10,000 pilots doesn't
even sound like enough after roughing up the numbers.

~~~
dmurray
13 pilots per plane sounds like more than enough.

Each plane needs two pilots at a time. Each plane is manned maybe 105 hours a
week (say 17 hours a day on average, less 5% of the time in maintenance), so
it requires 210 pilot-hours per week. A full time employee works about 35
hours a week after sick leave and holidays. So you need about six full-time
pilots per plane.

Pilots spend some time in training and admin outside of the plane, but it
could hardly amount to enough to double the staffing requirements, especially
for Southwest who are famously lean and efficient. I'd guess a significant
number of the 10,000 are on standby or get limited hours (but of course need
to be trained to the same level as full-timers).

~~~
LanceH
You need 1 crew per flight, but really 2 crews per day per plane. Pilots work
about half the days, so 4 crews per plane. That gets you to 8 pilots per
plane, which is roughly 6k pilots without redundancy or pilots working very
limited segments.

------
superbrane
Interesting that Boeing does no make the simulators directly but through
partners. Having a delay in making the simulators might be because the makers
of the simulators are having problems with the software replication from the
real plane. Wonder what happens when the software on the simulators is in
desync with the software on the real plane; or when software on the real plane
has a bug that manifests only after 10 hour of continuous operation while the
software on the simulator is continuously resetted for each new pilot. On the
other hand, Boeing and the airlines should have provided more simulators if
their new model is so different that it needs a dedicated simulator. One idea
- Boeing should only sell new planes together with simulators - 1 simulator
included for each x planes delivered.

~~~
bkor
> Boeing and the airlines should have provided more simulators if their new
> model is so different that it needs a dedicated simulator

I highly recommend reading this article:

[https://onemileatatime.com/boeing-737-max-lion-air-
simulator...](https://onemileatatime.com/boeing-737-max-lion-air-
simulator/#boeing_mocked_lion_air_for_wanting_737_max_simulator_training)

The first crash was with Lion Air. Boeing mocked them for wanting simulators.
After the crash, Boeing claimed pilots of Lion Air were at fault. This while
saying no simulator training was needed.

~~~
o-__-o
>Boeing mocked them for wanting simulators.

These were the conversations of two employees. I wouldn't say that Boeing
outright mocked them but, in the processes going on above the employees
paygrade, simulators were difficult to get to Lion Air

~~~
stopads
You think because the employees weren't executives and they were talking to
eachother it's all ok? What on earth are you talking about?

Boeing employees should be in prison, there shouldn't be bail while awaiting
trial. This is a act of willful negligence and deceit and coverup that killed
hundreds of people. It's one of the biggest crimes ever in the history of our
country.

~~~
ta999999171
They're a defense contractor, they can't commit crimes.

~~~
ulfw
Hahahahaha

------
t0mas88
Simulators normally already run very close to 24x7. Not strange at all to have
a 1am sim slot or 5am or similar at most airlines. So this is going to be
chaos if the MAX is reauthorized to fly before everyone is trained.

------
jaclaz
I wonder how the validation of correspondence between the actual plane (with
the unknown/unreleased MCAS related mods) and the simulator behaviour is
performed, i.e. who (Boeing, the simulator manufacturers, the FAA, experienced
test pilots) actually does what and - ultimately - which kind of "stamp"
attests that the simulator is a valid representation of the plane behaviour
(and how much time is it needed to perform this step).

~~~
anon463637
Scrounging around for simulators or wondering how close it is to the real
thing is moot because the 737 MAX is dead. The CEO is gone and there are more
and more safety "glitches" being discovered. Even if they return them to
service, who is going to fly on them? You? Sorry, but the cheapening-out on
engineering and manufacturing over the years has eventually produced a New
Coke, who's side-effect is that it kills the consumer. There's only "classic
Coke" as a fix (737 NG), but that's not much better. In fact, Al Jazeera did
an exposé in 2010 about the internal whistleblower who was ignored by Boeing
management when it was revealed that substandard critical structural
components made by subcontractor Ducommun were being crudely constructed by-
hand and were grossly out of tolerances, yet Boeing management ordered them
installed on customer planes anyhow. 737 NG's (-6xx, -7xx, -8xx, -9xx) have
already been involved in hard landings and runway overruns where the fuselages
broke apart, killing passengers, when previous similar airframes survived
intact but were possibly damaged and needed inspections. These NG's are flying
around above your head today, and it's unclear if the next landing or severe
turbulence is going to rip the plane apart because it was either poorly
engineered or poorly manufactured due to decades of lax "self-
regulation"/regulatory capture and corporate greed. Some engineering areas and
some planes were made better than others, but it's unnecessarily playing
Russian roulette with people's lives because management used "creative" ways
to cut corners.

If you want less micromorts, stick to well-maintained older 737's/777's and
Airbus.

~~~
7952
The capital cost of the 737 Max fleet is likely to be at least $20 billion. Do
you think the airlines or Boeing are just going to write that off?

~~~
throwanem
Do you think they won't get bailouts?

~~~
heavenlyblue
To get a bailout they need to act as if it were important.

------
fyfy18
Does anyone have any reading material on how the simulators work? Do they run
the same computer hardware as actual aircraft, or is it all simulated? If it's
simulated, how do they avoid the issue of a bug not being present in the
simulator?

~~~
jrockway
I don't think the simulator is designed to QA test the airplane. It's only for
training pilots, and pilots are only trained on procedures that airlines deem
worth training for. This is things like engine failures at inopportune
moments, stall recovery, etc. The idea is not to simulate the outcome of
strange circumstances, but to get pilots comfortable with procedures. So if
there is some bug, it doesn't matter -- if you're training pilots to take off
after v1* is called out and an engine fails at that exact moment, the
instructor is not looking to see that "hey we applied the brakes and the
airplane stopped OK with light rain and 3 knots of wind", they are looking to
see that the pilot continues the takeoff anyway and doesn't try to stop on the
runway. The pass condition is following procedure, not "well that's not the
procedure but it looks like everyone lived anyway".

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V_speeds#V1_definitions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V_speeds#V1_definitions)

The various data that feeds into training procedures comes from actually
flying the real airplane.

~~~
superbrane
Since the planes become more software dependent, the pilots should be trained
on procedures to recognize/evaluate/react to software problems/glitches as
well. The problems with the B-MAX were actually related to bad software
(MCAS). There is probably some delay between how pilots are training and the
importance of software in their job.

~~~
HPsquared
I think, functionally speaking, a software failure is no different to that of
hardware-based control / instrumentation systems (think of all the odd
behaviour that could be caused by a short circuit or a bad connection
somewhere in the wiring). The difference is that software systems tend to be
more complex, and failures are in theory less random and more systematic -
it's more a case of stepping on an unlikely combination of inputs (i.e. a bug
that occurs in an untested corner-case) than encountering a random component
failure which is more likely the case for a hardware system.

Edit: actually I suppose I just made your point

------
laydn
The article says Southwest has 10.000 737 pilots. Let's say all of them will
be trained. The article also says that simulator training costs 0.5-1K USD per
hour. Let's take the higher figure. So that means 5M USD per hour training for
all pilots (two pilots per simulator). Let's then speculate and say that the
FAA approved training package is 10 hours (I believe this will turn out to be
less than 3).

We're looking at 50M USD cost of training pilots for the MAX, for an airline
which ordered almost 300 MAX planes.

That is less than 200K USD per plane. It is depressing that this was being
weighed against loss of human life.

~~~
donarb
There's other costs as well. An untrained pilot can't fly, meaning that the
airline is shorthanded. If you don't have enough trained pilots, you have to
cancel flights and lose revenue.

~~~
ulfw
Which they now had to do for over a year. So that was some great cost-saving
exercise again...

------
dehrmann
With all the effort Boeing put into making controls the same, I wonder why
they couldn't just release a software update for existing 737 simulators that
adds the ability to switch to Max characteristics. I get the no new training
was a goal of the Max, but in existing simulators would at least be a
consolation prize.

~~~
salawat
The issue they're getting bit by now is that technically, MAX can't be
architected the same way as older 737's due to the Flight Computer
representing a single point of failure with catastrophic consequences.

Older 737's are fine having two separate Flight Computers with only one in
command at a time. MCAS changed that. So they now have to consider significant
hardware/software rearchitecture which goes beyond a mere

    
    
       If(MAX){
          MCAS();
         } else {
          otherStuff():
         }
    

For instance, early on in the investigation, pilots had to use the NG
simulators with manual fault injection to recreate the experience because the
MCAS software simply wasn't there.

[https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-
aerospace/newly...](https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-
aerospace/newly-stringent-faa-tests-spur-a-fundamental-software-redesign-
of-737-max-flight-controls/)

The "newly-stringent" tests described are basically 101 level test cases in
excluding catastrophic outcomes from a design, where you basically assume the
perfect confluence of bit flips occur to ruin your day. If you've done your
job right, that shouldn't end up being a problem.

Boeing didn't, therefore, it was a problem.

------
raverbashing
The title makes it sound like simulators are going extinct

In fact, now that training is going to be needed, new simulators are going to
be built, but it takes time. Maybe some 737ng Sims can be converted

By the way, some airlines have their own but several have their crews train in
outsourced training facilities (CAE, etc)

------
timwaagh
what surprises me is that there are even any simulators for this plane, when
the manufacturer said such training isn't necessary. apparantly some airlines
still put safety above everything.

~~~
thisisnico
It's worth it from a financial perspective. If a plane goes down it hurts the
brand and public trust significantly. People in general are already afraid of
flying, lets not give them more reasons :)

------
cryptica
>> The 737 MAX has been grounded since March 2019 after two fatal crashes and
cannot return to service until regulators approve software changes and
training plans.

My understanding from the previous wave of news was that two planes crashed
because they stalled in mid air because their engines were too large and too
far forward and that somehow affected the plane's center of gravity... And the
solution is a software update? You can't fix hardware problems with software.

I wonder if this is a trend. First Intel and now Boeing... Shipping defective
products and then trying to hack together patches on top.

~~~
r3drock
They did not stall because of the engines. The plane would be perfectly
flyable without mcas, the plane only behaves differently. But in order to
avoid recertification boeing decided to tweak the plane behaviour with mcas so
that there is no noticeable difference for the pilots. In hindsight this
obviously wasn't done right.

