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Successful calls:

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The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

We'll have to wait for the investigation to know what went wrong, but it doesn't look good for the 737 Max 8.

While Boeing has been dominating the wide body market, the opposite is true of the narrow body market. They really screwed up when they canceled the 757 rather than re-engined it just before airlines discovered that a 757 or A-321 is the perfect option for point-to-point transatlantic flights between medium sized destinations.

Even before launch, I couldn't help but feel Boeing was making a mistake unleashing a 4th generation of their venerable 737 jet, one which still has the same exact 148 inch fuselage width and low ground clearance that they had in the 1960s. You can only do so much with those constraints. They needed an entirely new design with this generation and sticking with the 737 will cost them.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

Here are some interesting data points for this most recent 737 crash.

The plane had sufficient speed but could not gain altitude. In fact, this plane was overspeeding as there is a hard set 250 knot limit below 10,000 feet

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

I thought FR24 had limited coverage and perhaps only three minutes of the flight?

FR24 has the first 3 minutes of the flight but not the final 3. (it was a 6 minute flight)

It is an incomplete picture of course. From what we can see, the aircraft was definitely overspeeding for its altitude.

We know the Lion Air flight was brought down by a faulty AoA sensor. I'm wondering (and this is just a theory) if the pilot had incorrect altitude readings being fed to him. It would explain why he would be greatly exceeding 250 knots below 10,000 feet.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

Honest question. Does the speed at that altitude put too much stress on the airframe?

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There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

Wonder how long Boeing is still trading north of 400?

The airframe should be able to handle that velocity at the altitude. The 250 knot rule is primarily in place to reduce collision risk at lower and heavier trafficked altitudes. However, seeing the pilot at 400 knots below, 10,000 feet makes me think the pilot wasn't getting accurate altitude readings. Once again, this is just a theory, but we'll see what happens when they have the CVR and FDR.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

I really hope that they explain the whys and what fors on this. But the corporate news channels likely won't allow it.

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There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

Boeing is going to have to get to the bottom of this. They were already losing market share in the narrow body market but this will open the floodgates there. Once an airliner receives a reputation of being a lawn dart, it's hard to shake it. I mean look at the DC-10. The issues faced by that airliner pretty much killed McDonnell Douglas.

I don't think Boeing is facing that same fate, but it just shows how high the stakes are for them to quickly identify and correct the issue at hand here. It's always possible this latest case is pilot error, but given what we know from Lion Air in October and what we can see here, I will be shocked if that is the case. Investigators will look at all angles and explore all possibilities.

I think it's almost certain that the airplane gets grounded for a few weeks. Grounding it isn't a death sentence as the 787 was grounded for a few weeks after suffering battery fires. That issue was fixed (although no injuries or casualties ever occurred from it) and the airplane has gone on without incident and become the best selling current wide-bodied aircraft since. I flew on 2 of them in just the last month and didn't have a second thought about my safety on them. I can't say I'd feel the same boarding a 737 Max right now.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

If I'm Boeing I'm definitely marketing the shit out of lightly updated 737 Max user guides and new "disaster avoidance guidance" instructions. Jack those prices up and hit fence sitters through the media to shame them into paying up. Everyone knows I'd reward that kind of activity.

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I have neither the time, or the inclination, to explain myself to a man who rises and sleep under the blanket of the very economic growth that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it.

You're a clown and a bigot. Why don't you attack white pilots for a change!

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it's back! plenty of seats available!

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/29/737-max-returns-to-the-us-after-deadly-crashes.html

People should feel safe..they are wearing masks!

even though this one is returning to the skies, the plane is forever tarred. Time for Boeing to just acknowledge this plane is a failure and start designing a new single aisle airliner that can at various lengths cover the 160-250 seat market. That's what they should have done and had originally planned to do around the time they launched the 787. Until they do that, the A320neo has won this generation for narrow bodies.

Even without these crashes the Max was going to fall short as it was never going to have a model that could match the A321LR in range, seating, and performance

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

Yeah, the design is flawed, and I don't care how much software they installed to correct, I'll never fly on it.

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is boeing planning on making new maxs or are they just trying to get the ones they already made back in service?

edit, looks like they started the production back up in july
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/07/07/it-moves-aggressively-restore-confidence-boeing-flies-into-an-uncertain-future/

Till they switch your plane at the last minute

Yeah, that's the issue with it. They're using the same airframe and ground clearance dimensions today as they used in the mid 60s when they launched the 737-100

Do you want to see what the engine on a 737-100 looked like vs a Max?



That is the problem here. The original 737s had JT8D engines, which were fine in the 1960s when low bypass was the norm.

However, we have since learned that low bypass turbofans are inefficient and excessively noisy so we have these larger CFM-56 high bypass engines on the Classic and NG models that were built over the last 35 years. It required some adjustments to work with the existing airframe and low ground clearance, but it could be done by flattening the bottom of the engine by moving components to the side (look at the inlet of a 737 NG and you'll see what I mean). This actually worked and that generation of 737 is arguably the most successful narrow body of all time.

However with the Max, they wanted to implement some of the 787 engine technology so we have the CFM LEAP. The intake on that one is so large that they had to position the engines forward of the wing (as seen in the picture) in order to allow enough ground clearance with the gears down. Well, that threw off the airplane's trim so they needed a computer to assist the pilots at all time, which is where MCAS kicks in to try to properly keep the aircraft trim. The system literally overrides the pilots and in 2 cases led to fatal crashes where the computer drove the airplane into the ground because Boeing put an engine designed for 2015 on an airframe designed for 1965. The original 737-100 fan diameter was 39.9" while the Max has one of 69.4"

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

wow. just fix the hardware problem in software? no wonder they kept tight lipped about this... there is no way that solution should have been allowed to pass.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

Another incident with the Max would likely spell the end for Boeing commercial, right?

People still have trust in their wide bodies. Boeing still has an edge over Airbus there. I don't know if confidence in the Max has much room to go lower though.

They really do need to start completely over on their narrow body line as they cannot just keep re-engining the 737. The NG was the last feasible go around for that and Boeing should have stuck with their plan from 10-15 years ago to replace the 737 entirely.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

i had no idea how bad this was. the MAX was clearly a corporate failure, stemming from greed to outright incompetency.

makes me wonder how many engineers tried sounding alarms but were forced to keep quiet. Boeing SHOULD be obliterated for this plane... this is god-awful from an engineering perspective, and also from a business perspective.

https://spectrum.ieee.org/aerospace/avi ... -developer

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

I seem to remember Airbus having a bad run with the glass cockpits and still managed to stay in business.

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It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

Good read

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The 737 itself had a few issues with the tail a few decades back but survived. People have short memories and don’t pay attention to this stuff anyway. Anyone remember Valujet? After a couple of crashes they were smart enough to change their name. Air Tran went on like nothing ever happened.

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They had an issue where the PCU controlling the rudder would throw it hard over. It took about 20 years of service for it to pop up though and it was something easily fixed whereas the issue with the Max is an issue inherent with the entire design of the model.

As for these issues being forgotten, most often yes, but not always. I'd say McDonnell Douglas's demise was rooted in the 1970s with the issues that the DC-10 had with both the cargo door and its lack of redundancies in the hydraulic system. Will that happen to Boeing? Probably not as they are still the king of wide bodies, but they may never regain the #1 spot on the narrow body market.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson