
Ask HN: Would you fly on a Boeing 737-MAX 8 today? - telesilla
I have a few flights coming up and checked that none of them, according to [1] are on a 737-MAX 8. I&#x27;m not sure what I&#x27;d do, if that was the case. What&#x27;s your take? Are the MAX 9 and 10 safer?<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;List_of_Boeing_737_operators
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chatmasta
I think the better question is, assuming you _need_ to fly somewhere, given
the choice between a 737-MAX 8 and another plane, how much more money would
you pay to ride on the other plane?

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atmosx
Oh, so instead of pushing flight safety for everyone, all we have to do is
lower the price “enough to make the risk acceptable”?

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shakkhar
Yes. Like most things in life, flight safety is not a binary choice. To
complete what you said - "we have to lower the price enough to make the risk
acceptable _to enough people so as to operate the flight at break even
point_".

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iruoy
This doesn't look good
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_737_MAX#Accidents_and_i...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_737_MAX#Accidents_and_incidents)

> The 737 MAX's Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) has
> come under scrutiny for faulty angle-of-attack readings in the Lion Air
> accident[126] and the apparent similarity of the Ethiopian Airlines
> crash.[127]

> On March 11, 2019, in response to the Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines
> crashes, the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) ordered the
> suspension of operations of the 96 Boeing 737 MAX 8s operated by Chinese-
> based airlines, citing the similarity between the two accidents. A number of
> airlines and regulatory authorities around the world followed suit, though
> some airlines still continued to operate the type as of this date.[128] On
> the same day, in response to the Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines crashes,
> Indonesia ordered the temporary suspension of operations of eleven Boeing
> 737 MAX 8s operated by Garuda Indonesia and Lion Air.[129][130] Inspection
> is set to begin on 12 March, 2019.[131]

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Someone1234
Today? Yes, I'd fly on one. Next week? We'll have to see.

We know very little about the Ethiopian Airlines crash (and yes I've see
flightradar24 data). The speculation is worried it is related MCAS like the
Lion Air crash, but until we know that even in a preliminary way it feels a
little knee-jerky to boycott 737-MAX 8s.

Assuming the flight data recorders are recoverable, we'll hopefully learn more
and can discover if there's any similarities between the two accidents. If
they are both MCAS related I suspect we'll see a international grounding of
the aircraft class.

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codegeek
I was just thinking about it yesterday and 2 major accidents in less than a
year and both flights crashing within minutes of takeoff is a serious concern.
I m definitely a bit scared. When we book flights, we generally don't check
the aircraft model but going forward, I may.

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muzani
I'd go on one. The odds are still safer than driving a car. The worst that can
happen is death, which is inevitable anyway.

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nicholas73
This statistic always bothers me. The statement is made true by reporting
deaths per mile, versus deaths per trip. Most of the risk is during takeoff
and landing, with thousands of miles in between. In contrast car trips are
short with most the risk during the actual miles. IIRC, going by deaths per
trip makes a flight about 3x more dangerous.

Now that's not a whole lot still, and the per mile stat is still important in
that one should not choose a cross state drive over a flight for safety
reasons.

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copperx
> Going by deaths per trip makes a flight about 3x more dangerous.

Do you mind sharing your back-of-the-napkin math? It seems wrong given the low
probability of crash per airplane flight (e.g., there are about 100,000
flights daily and close to zero per day fatal crashes). In fact, about one
fatal air crash happens every 7,000,000 airplane flights. I don't know anybody
who knows anybody that has died in a commercial airplane crash. I had 2
friends that died in traffic accidents. Anecdotes aren't data, but no one
would be surprised by these numbers.

Here are the odds of dying by cause: [https://www.nsc.org/work-safety/tools-
resources/injury-facts...](https://www.nsc.org/work-safety/tools-
resources/injury-facts/chart)

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telesilla
I would also want to filter out plane crashes caused by interference:
suicides, bombings, hijackings, birdstrike and the like. This is because I fly
happier knowing that mechanical or electrical error is so very very low. This
would include however cases such as Air France Flight 447, which was a
combination of faulty readings and human error. So, the recent Ethiopia and
Lion air crashes would definitely be included, though maybe these were
avoidable if the pilots were better educated? So I guess I'd need to see three
categories: outside interference, pilot error, mechanical/electrical error.

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sparkling
The thing that scratches my head: after the Lion Air incident, all 737 MAX
operators should have been made aware and relayed relevant info on the problem
to their pilots. Surely the Ethiopia pilots heard about the incident and were
aware of the issue?

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dev_north_east
Nope. I've double checked all my booked flights for the rest of the year to
ensure I'm not going on any of them.

I think this is gonna be a big issue and we'll see the entire fleet scraped.

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maxbaines
No.

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ArtWomb
Yeah. It's just China (and Ethiopia) grounding flights due to geo-trade
leverage. If $BA drops 30% it may even be time to load up. Besides, once its
your time to go...

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Someone1234
China (aka Comac) is manufacturing them in Zhoushan. How does it help China in
"geo-trade leverage" when they're grounding planes Chinese workers are
building and selling?

