'Cozy' relationship between Boeing and the US draws scrutiny amid 737 MAX 9 mess

It wasn't just time to market. That impetus led to bad ideas chased the tails of other bad ideas in a spiral: You can't need pilot training, but you must have more efficient engines; a kludge for more efficient engines was applied, but it led to stall situations that would require pilot training; MCAS was added but could not be documented to pilots because they shouldn't need to know because that would undermine the claim no simulator time was needed for training, and because there are too few 737MAX simulators and too many pilots.

Boeing is still benefiting from a cozy relationship because no hardware changes were employed in the fix, MCAS is still controlling trim, simulator training for AOA/MCAS issues isn't required and there are probably other ways in which safety did not come first before getting 737MAX deliveries back on line.

If you are wondering how mighty Boeing had to have an expedient low-cost development project based on a 50 year old design when Boeing also sells a carbon fiber wonder-plane called Dreamliner, go down the Harry Stonecipher GE Jack Welch Six Sigma McDonnell Douglas outsource-everything rabbit hole. The 787 is a very nice plane to ride in, but it was tens of billions over budget, far more expensive to build than the aggressive outsourcing plan envisioned, doesn't fly as far as planned, and may not be profitable on a per unit basis yet.

Boeing very badly needed a cash cow.

And here's the internal doc that told then that's what would happen: https://techrights.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/2014130646...

Airbus has many of the same flaws. Look at the pictures of the A350 paint from Qatar. It's not so much the paint flaking that bothers me, but the way Airbus went out of their way to dismiss Qatar airlines' concerns as irrelevant to safety.

When there's this much flaking it can't be considered non safety critical anymore. In many cases a rough undersurface was exposed and an airplane hull is much more efficient when smooth. Also some of the flakes will end up in the engines or sensors.

Really that was not a good show from airbus.

Personal engineering experiences, Boeing accepts QA reports from vendors without reading them. Airbus reviews similar reports and challenges the tiniest thing.

Tis one of the many reasons I fly Airbus.

and in Germany. and in England. and in Spain.

But Airbus planes are not falling from the skies.