
Boeing waited until after Lion Air crash to tell Southwest safety alert was off - magtux
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/28/boeing-didnt-tell-southwest-that-safety-feature-on-737-max-was-turned-off-wsj.html
======
RankingMember
For anyone interested in an insider's perspective on recent quality issues at
Boeing, check out this short New York Times podcast wherein they interview
whistleblowers.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/23/podcasts/the-
daily/boeing...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/23/podcasts/the-daily/boeing-
dreamliner-charleston.html)

The excerpt that stands out to me the most related the story of one of the
whistleblowers finding pieces of debris within a 787 aircraft (between the
passenger compartment and the skin), telling his supervisor, and then being
told not to worry about it. In another case, a whistleblower in charge of
defective inventory found that some of the items marked defective were going
missing and ending up installed on aircraft to meet production goals rather
than wait for a proper replacement, the red paint marking them defective
having been clumsily rubbed off.

~~~
itsaidpens
These stories are from an acquired factory - it seems like they acquired a lot
of problems when they bought Embraer.

~~~
cryptonector
Who knows. Maybe the problems where imposed on those factories.

------
simion314
As I commented in previous articles here on HN, the chance that there are
other subsystems that were rushed and self-approved by Boeing is not zero,
people thinking that fixing the MCAS is enough are forgetting to consider that
other components had to be updated for the new design.

------
mhandley
And it's recently emerged that the AoA sensor misread itself may have been
Boeing's fault, and due to foreign object damage to wiring:

[https://interestingengineering.com/boeing-whistleblowers-
rep...](https://interestingengineering.com/boeing-whistleblowers-report-
more-737-max-8-problems-to-faa)

Boeing also has foreign object damage problems on the 787 and on the KC46
tankers. Looks like this story still has a long way to run.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/20/business/boeing-
dreamline...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/20/business/boeing-dreamliner-
production-problems.html)

[https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-
aerospace/u-s-a...](https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-
aerospace/u-s-air-force-again-halts-delivery-of-boeings-tanker-over-debris/)

~~~
RankingMember
Wow, I'm surprised that's not more well-known (that the USAF halted all
deliveries of the KC-46 after finding loose material and debris in delivered
planes). Amazingly bad.

I wonder what the odds are that the Dreamliner gets grounded (again) soon to
have them all gone over with a fine-tooth comb.

------
porpoisemonkey
I've recently contacted all of the major airlines that fly the 737 Max as well
as my congressional representatives and the FAA to let them know I have
serious reservations about a software fix to the aircraft.

If this issue is concerning to you I'd recommend you do the same. To make it
easier, I've put the links to all the contact sites below.

United Airlines
[https://www.united.com/ual/en/us/customer/customercare](https://www.united.com/ual/en/us/customer/customercare)

Southwest Airlines [https://www.southwest.com/contact-us/contact-
us.html](https://www.southwest.com/contact-us/contact-us.html)

American Airlines
[https://www.aa.com/contact/forms?topic=CR#/](https://www.aa.com/contact/forms?topic=CR#/)

Find your Congressional representatives
[https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-
representati...](https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-
representative)

FAA [https://hotline.faa.gov/](https://hotline.faa.gov/)

------
magtux
I always had great respect for aerospace and thought they'd put safety above
all else but seeing all this, Boeing seems like a fucking travesty.

~~~
ilikehurdles
Boeing opened its South Carolina plant to avoid a unionized workforce, and
that plant has been responsible for producing these horrific excuses they call
airplanes. They had the benefit of a doubt before, but now it's clear that
Boeing's leadership, like that of other public companies, values cheap labor
over safety.

~~~
tomatotomato37
I'm not sure how unions have any relations to this. They exist as a mediator
between management and workers for pay and rights; customer satisfaction or
safety is completely outside their domain

~~~
ilikehurdles
Unions give employees the knowledge and leverage to push back against
unrealistic demands, deadlines, and cost-cutting measures without retaliation.
These kinds of rushed solutions causing more problems down the line are caused
by a culture that rewards employees who put up with managers breathing down
their neck.

~~~
CamperBob2
Irrelevant in this case, though. While concerns have indeed been raised about
SC production quality, this particular story involves an engineering failure,
not a production issue. Boeing engineers are unionized through SPEEA. They can
bring the company to its knees at contract negotiation time, and they have
done so in the past.

~~~
robocat
I disagree, it is _also_ a production issue because:

"One whistleblower reported to the FAA that they had seen damage to the
electrical wiring connected to the plane’s angle of attack sensor from a
foreign object, which feeds data to the MCAS system so it can determine
whether it needs to engage to prevent the plane from stalling. This wouldn’t
be the first time Boeing’s manufacturing process reportedly had problems
guarding plane components against foreign object debris produced by the
fabrication process."

~~~
CamperBob2
Stuff happens. The fact that damage to a single AOA sensor -- whether in the
factory or in the field -- could cause this sort of event is strictly an
engineering issue.

~~~
robocat
It is most definitely not "strictly" an engineering issue.

By that logic you can say it is a quality control, FAA or management issue
(and not an engineering issue) - because the engineering problem was not
caught by other systems.

Also "engineering" created the AoA disagree alert. Whoever decided to make
that an optional feature should be "strictly" at fault? Maybe it is the fault
of the airlines that decided not to have that feature installed?

Engineering is just one part of a complex system so why do you think
engineering should be blamed 100% for failures that occurred due to the whole
system?

~~~
CamperBob2
_Engineering is just one part of a complex system so why do you think
engineering should be blamed 100% for failures that occurred due to the whole
system?_

Because that's the only way something this complicated can possibly work.
Fault tolerance is optional only if failure is considered to be a valid
option.

Getting back to what happened in _this_ case: at some point, a Boeing engineer
was asked to make MCAS work with input from only one AoA sensor. That person
could have made all the difference by saying, "Lol no," and SPEEA would have
had their back.

~~~
robocat
You should be rebutting my points. To rebut your new points:

I think failure is _always_ acceptable engineering: a defining feature of
engineering is finding compromises because we don't have infinite resources,
infinite ability, or perfect materials.

> a Boeing engineer was asked to make MCAS work

That sounds like you are just making stuff up about a team of engineers. So
your opinion is this is all the fault of a single engineer? Not engineering
after all?

~~~
CamperBob2
1\. Add MCAS system to artificially make airplane fly as if it were a
different airplane.

2\. Drive MCAS with only one AOA sensor.

3\. Don't tell MCAS to look for (or even think about) bad AOA data or AOA
disagreements.

4\. Equip airplane with two AOA sensors as usual, but make the AOA disagree
warning light a "value added option" that customers have to pay extra for.

5\. Don't actually bother to tell pilots that they don't have AOA disagree
warning lights.

6\. Don't bother to tell pilots that MCAS exists at all.

7\. Don't test MCAS subsystem to see what it actually does with bad AOA data.

8\. Give MCAS a ridiculous amount of control authority, operating cumulatively
over repeated applications to exceed what the pilot can manually override.

Now, exactly _what_ items on this list are the responsibility of non-union
labor in a South Carolina assembly plant, or whatever other mistuned horn
you're tooting? Once again, in the absence of gross engineering malpractice, a
broken AOA sensor is no big deal.

------
gdubs
If I recall from earlier reporting, this is the safety light that Southwest
paid extra to have installed, right?

------
jbarberu
I don't fly very often, but being in the midst of booking flights I'm very
thankful for websites having filters by airplane type. I'll be paying the
additional 10-20% to not set foot on a Boeing this time.

------
larrik
Wow, I'd be surprised if some young congressperson doesn't make their career
by publicly eviscerating Boeing soon.

~~~
mieseratte
I hope you don't think it's going to be a US congresscritter.

"Why do you hate American jobs!"

~~~
dontbenebby
You can turn that logic around real quick since Boeing also makes planes and
other equipment for the US military:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_Defense,_Space_%26_Secu...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_Defense,_Space_%26_Security)

You don't hate the troops after all, _do_ you?

~~~
JudgeWapner
yep, "think of the troops" is just as emotive (and patronizing) as "think of
the children". Unbelievable that people repeatedly fall for it.

~~~
dontbenebby
I think it's valid to think about both. I just think sometimes people try to
reduce risk to zero with no regard for the fact a zero risk society is one
without civil liberties.

------
karlkatzke
"If it's boeing I ain't going"

~~~
LeoPanthera
I wonder how many serious problems Airbus have that we simply don't know about
because they haven't been caught.

~~~
village-idiot
Well, they designed their airframe to handle the larger engines properly,
rather than patching it with software. So I'm going to wager that the answer
is "a lot less".

~~~
xvf22
Boeing shot themselves in the foot after the awful outsourced supply chain [0]
and battery problems on the 787 which meant that they had less financial
resources available to go clean sheet and instead they adapted an old design.

[0] [https://www.consultancy.uk/news/297/outsourcing-main-
cause-f...](https://www.consultancy.uk/news/297/outsourcing-main-cause-for-
boeing-787-dreamliner-problems)

~~~
village-idiot
I call these strategies "bonuses today, bankruptcy tomorrow".

------
gthtjtkt
This is pretty disturbing and makes me far more confident in my decision to
never set foot on a Boeing airplane again.

I thought the American airlines had all opted for the AoA disagree light, but
now it sounds like Southwest didn't have it because Boeing lied to them and
said it was standard.

------
agumonkey
very timely, AvE just made a teardown of an AOAS
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhZ0D-JRtz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhZ0D-JRtz0)

