Maybe when airlines start advertising that they don’t use the new 737s.

The more likely scenario is that the Chinese or Europeans will ground the new 737s until some very expensive fix is put into place and not accept any workarounds. That would probably make a difference.

FYI: https://qz.com/1569865/china-grounds-737-max-8-after-ethiopi...

Statistically speaking it's not worth worrying about. In 2021 there were less than 0.001 deaths per 100M passenger miles. Assuming these aircraft are 10x more dangerous than the alternative, that works out to 0.01 deaths per 100M passenger miles, or 0.00000026 deaths NY to SF flight. For an average american aged 38.9 years[2] with 40 years of life left[3], that works out to a loss of life of 5.4 minutes. I don't think most americans would worry over this, especially compared to other far more deadly threats like obesity.

[1] https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/home-and-community/safety-topics...

[2] https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2023/populati...

[3] https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html

Unfortunately consumers don't have much choice, the airline can change which type operates a flight at any time.

However longer term if Boeing's reputation keeps getting worse that can motivate buying decisions by the airlines. That change will be a very slow one, because fleet changes cost a lot of money in training crews, changing maintenance etc.

For example KLM is changing their short-haul fleet from the 737 NG to the A320neo family, that will take many years to completely roll out.

I doubt ever, consumers have been proven to select the cheapest airline ticket. The average once-a-year flier likely has no idea what aircraft they are even flying on.

I think HN really overestimates the impact of events like this with the general public.

The very first A320 demonstration flight crashed, killing 3 people, allegedly due to software issues in the new fly-by-wire system, and then involved allegations that Airbus had tampered with the investigation. The demonstration flight was mostly journalists on the plane. [0]

The A330 crashed on one of its certification flights due to an issue with the autopilot, killing all 7 onboard. [1]

Both went on to be some of the all-time best selling aircraft, and meanwhile today in this thread you have people touting Airbus as a paragon of safety. Humans have a short memory.

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_296Q

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus_Industrie_Flight_129

I mention these two specifically because they're examples of high-profile failures attributed due to issues with the aircraft early in their lifecycle, but basically every single popular aircraft type (except the B777 and A350) have had serious issues and loss of life due to manufacturing defects, but still went on to be overall successes. Hell, people still flew on the DC-10 even after its _numerous_ issues like AA 191..

I think it would require a fatal air crash of an American flight with a major celebrity on board.

People don't change their behavior much when things like this happen. When it comes around to the next big travel weekend, people will continue to book on whatever airline gets them to the right place at the right time for the right price.

Even when people have a direct ability to change what vehicle they travel on, like with car sales, safety incidents/features/records/etc have little impact to no on sales.

This is one of the reasons why transportation safety is regulated rather than being left up to market forces. Market forces don't really have an impact until the safety risk reaches some extreme levels.

People are very bad at managing risk. Even with all this, a 737-NG is infinitely safer than getting in a car, and yet people drive every day. Getting into your sedan is several orders of magnitude riskier than a 737. You're far more likely to die en route to the airport.

Obviously that doesn't excuse Boeing, I'm just saying, by the numbers.

[edit] The US has 1.5 deaths per 100M passenger-miles driven. [1]

The 737 NG has hit 10,000,000 flight hours 5 year into operating. That should be around 500,000,000 miles flown. About 180 seats per plane makes that ~90B seat-miles. That's 0.0038 deaths per 100M seat-miles flown.

So the 737-NG models are about 400X safer per mile than a car.

The median American lives 17mi from an airport, so the safety break-even point is 13,600mi flown on a 737-NG, assuming your destination is also a median 17mi away from the airport. If you're flying less than 13,600mi on a given 737 one-way trip, you're more likely to die getting to and from the airport.

Unless my math is off. This is just napkin math.

[1] https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/motor-vehicle/historical-fatalit...

As far as I can see, there's no real way to communicate this preference to airlines. I won't book a flight on a MAX, but the airline can change the airframe at the last second and it's highly situational how willing/able I am to just refuse to fly if they swap in a MAX.

I'd be willing to pay a premium not to fly on such an aircraft but not too big, as even though they aren't quite as safe as they should be, my impression is that the risk is still fairly low. Something on the order of 5%

The typical person does not have the information about these failures, won't prioritize better odds of survival over short-term savings, and do not have enough money to choose alternatives anyway.