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Comment by ajnin | Hacker News Reader

> Boeing charges extra, for example, for a backup fire extinguisher in the cargo hold. Past incidents have shown that a single extinguishing system may not be enough to put out flames that spread rapidly through the plane.

Well that's something that is not comforting to read. Charging extra for comfier seats, I can understand, but charging extra for features that might be the difference between life and death for 100+ persons, that's just sick and criminal in my mind.

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What’s more criminal is not buying the extra safety features. Creating safety features, while important, is not free. Someone has to pay for it, no matter how many lives they save. Hard to fault Boeing there.

It’s like side air bags in cars. Some have them, some don’t, but if you want them you will pay an extra 2 grand as each airbag unit is easily a grand each, and must be replaced completely if it ever deploys. If you buy your teenager a car you can decide if you will pay extra for those safety features.

Sure, safety features aren't free, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't be included. If that raises your cost, you increase the cost of the plane, not offer it as an optional add-on.

Raising the cost per plane is not so simple of a solution in some markets, and may make it very difficult to stay competitive, putting you out of business there entirely. Also, not all planes might be purchased for passenger travel, maybe a plane is used for package delivery and doesn’t need to come with so much extra safety. Who knows.

In a world where air travel is remarkably safe, throwing in the extra fire extinguisher that may make the difference between a near miss and a tragedy seems like it'd pay for itself many times over versus the alternative even if you just consider the PR impact.

My thoughts, too. Certain core safety features should be included by default, to avoid the possibility of an uninformed buyer dooming the people flying their airline.

Auto manufacturers don't make an engine compartment firewall optional, or sell full-strength seatbelts as an upgrade.

But where do you draw the line? Optional tempered glass? Optional seat belts? Optional ABS?

I think the idea is that some safety features are so important they shouldn't be optimal.

" Optional tempered glass? Optional seat belts? Optional ABS?"

Not arguing against safety, and this doesn't relate to aircraft at all, but your examples are interesting.

Pretty sure all three of those were optional when they were new things. The pattern of being optional on luxury vehicles, then standard on luxury models / optional on normal models, and finally, standard on all vehicles...is common.

when you buy a car do you just buy a tank or apc?

I'm sorry, but the safety features in question here were software upgrades. The incremental cost to Boeing to add it to every aircraft during manufacturing would be negligible.

In my view it should be criminal to withhold such safety features for profit.

Road vehicle manufacturers also charge extra for safety features.

The person who will be occupying the vehicle gets to make those decisions. Unless you're buying your own 737, you don't get to make that choice.

Where to begin? 1) That doesn't make it acceptable 2) My car doesn't fit 200 people 3) I can smash a window and jump out of my car if it is on fire.

I also find that extremely strange, but maybe I'm in the minority. I think Toyota has safety features standard in all trims.

Regardless, the safety requirements in planes are much more stringent than in road vehicles.

why is it becoming a trend to make idiot analogies that are clearly useless as an argument (because they aren't the same thing) here in hackernews?!

I don't think it's as simple as the article has made out. Many different airlines spec these planes for many different types of flight, and types of cargo - that's why features are optional. E.g. if an airline operates many routes on which the hold is likely to contain a high proportion of hazardous material, they can spec the additional fire suppression system. Even with a single system, the plane's certification will require that it can contain a hold fire for {X} mins (long enough to allow the plane to land and evacuate).

Isn’t it a security feature linked to a max load or a category of cargo? It could be a good reason: “Mixing cargo and luggage is only allowed on planes with a secondary extinguisher” => We sell the secondary, not because security is optional, but because we sell the ability to do something more with the plane.

Welcome to capitalism.

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