Tag: Boeing 737 crash

Boeing, Obama, A Gold Watch, And 346 Dead

Authored by Russell Mokhiber via Counterpunch.org,

Democrats want to make Donald Trump the issue in 2020.

If they do, they will lose again, the way they lost in 2016.

Instead, the 2020 election should be about corporate power in all of its manifestations, its hold on the culture, our country and both major political parties.

Take the case of the two Boeing 737 Max 8 airplane crashes — the Lion Air crash off the coast of Jakarta, Indonesia in October 2018 that killed all 189 on board and the Ethiopian Airlines crash in March 2019 that killed all 157 on board.

During his time as President of the United States, Barack Obama promoted the sale of Boeing planes — including the 737 Max 8 planes — around the world.

In November 2011, in Bali, Indonesia, President Obama announced an agreement between Boeing and Lion Air.

Continue reading “Boeing, Obama, A Gold Watch, And 346 Dead”

“It Was Go, Go, Go”: Boeing Rushed 737 MAX Design In Race With Airbus

Via ZeroHedge

A major decision that Boeing made almost a decade ago has resulted in the greatest threat to the aerospace giant’s reputation and the bottom line at the company after two major plane crashes in just under six months.

Back in 2011, American Airlines, who was an exclusive Boeing customer for more than 10 years, was getting ready to defect from the company in favor of purchasing hundreds of new jets from Airbus, according to The New York Times. Airbus had been stealing market share from Boeing for several years, and losing American Airlines would have been a crushing blow, costing billions of dollars in lost sales and thousands of jobs.

So when the CEO of American Airlines called Boeing to let them know a deal with Airbus was close, Boeing scrapped its plans of developing a new passenger plane and decided to instead hastily update its workhorse 737, promising the plane would be done in six years.

The 737 Max was born roughly three months later.

Continue reading ““It Was Go, Go, Go”: Boeing Rushed 737 MAX Design In Race With Airbus”

Capt. Sullenberger on the FAA and Boeing: ‘Our credibility as leaders in aviation is being damaged’

Guest Post by Sully Sullenberger

For most of the history of powered flight, the United States has been a world leader in aviation.

This nation’s aviation regulatory body, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), has long been the gold standard of safety regulation in global aviation, often a template for other nations to follow in technical and safety matters.

Boeing BA, +0.42% has long been the world’s preeminent airplane maker.

But now, our credibility as leaders in aviation is being damaged. Boeing and the FAA have been found wanting in this ugly saga that began years ago but has come home to roost with two terrible fatal crashes, with no survivors, in less than five months, on a new airplane type, the Boeing 737 Max 8, something that is unprecedented in modern aviation history.

Continue reading “Capt. Sullenberger on the FAA and Boeing: ‘Our credibility as leaders in aviation is being damaged’”

Is The Boeing 737 Max Crisis An Artificial Intelligence Event?

Authored by James Thompson via The Unz Review,

Conventional wisdom is that it is too early to speculate why in the past six months two Boeing 737 Max 8 planes have gone down shortly after take off, so if all that follows is wrong you will know it very quickly. Last night I predicted that the first withdrawals of the plane would happen within two days, and this morning China withdrew it. So far, so good. (Indonesia followed a few hours ago).

Why should I stick my neck out with further predictions?

First, because we must speculate the moment something goes wrong. It is natural, right and proper to note errors and try to correct them.(The authorities are always against “wild” speculation, and I would be in agreement with that if they had an a prior definition of wildness).

Second, because putting forward hypotheses may help others test them (if they are not already doing so).

Third, because if the hypotheses turn out to be wrong, it will indicate an error in reasoning, and will be an example worth studying in psychology, so often dourly drawn to human fallibility. Charmingly, an error in my reasoning might even illuminate an error that a pilot might make, if poorly trained, sleep-deprived and inattentive.

I think the problem is that the Boeing anti-stall patch MCAS is poorly configured for pilot use: it is not intuitive, and opaque in its consequences.

Continue reading “Is The Boeing 737 Max Crisis An Artificial Intelligence Event?”