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Boeing Delays 737 Max Software Fix (arstechnica.com)
Boeing's promised software fix for its 737 Max planes involved in two deadly crashes since October has been pushed back several weeks after an internal review by engineers not connected to the aircraft raised additional safety questions. "The results of the 'non-advocate' review have not been revealed, but the Federal Aviation Administration confirmed on April 1 that the software needed additional work," reports Ars Technica. From the report: "The FAA expects to receive Boeing's final package of its software enhancement over the coming weeks for FAA approval," an FAA spokesperson said in a statement. "Time is needed for additional work by Boeing as the result of an ongoing review of the 737 MAX Flight Control System to ensure that Boeing has identified and appropriately addressed all pertinent issues." Just how far back the delivery of the MCAS patch has been pushed is uncertain. The New York Times reports that the update's schedule has been pushed back "several weeks." And after its delivery, an FAA spokesperson said, "the FAA will subject Boeing's completed submission to a rigorous safety review. The FAA will not approve the software for installation until the agency is satisfied with the submission."
This means it could be months before grounded Boeing 737 MAX aircraft are once again deemed airworthy. And that means more flight cancellations for airlines that have the aircraft in their inventory. Southwest Airlines, Boeing's largest 737 MAX customer, canceled all of its flights dependent on its 34 737 MAX aircraft through April 20 so far -- about 150 flights per day. And Boeing's delivery of new 737 MAX aircraft -- the company's best-seller -- has been indefinitely delayed.
This means it could be months before grounded Boeing 737 MAX aircraft are once again deemed airworthy. And that means more flight cancellations for airlines that have the aircraft in their inventory. Southwest Airlines, Boeing's largest 737 MAX customer, canceled all of its flights dependent on its 34 737 MAX aircraft through April 20 so far -- about 150 flights per day. And Boeing's delivery of new 737 MAX aircraft -- the company's best-seller -- has been indefinitely delayed.
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Boeing will be sued out of existence for this negligence. The MBA-esque desire to charge a few extra bucks for an essential safety system will mean they shall pay billions.
right... and some idiots are out there panting over how much we need to ban driver controlled vehicles and we must move to AI/Autonomous vehicles ASAP!!!! This right here is why we shouldn't /sensor issue was worked out/tested and approved before the Dept of _____________ signed off on it. horse hockey.. no thank you.
can you imagine if your car was "grounded" for months while a safety computer control
If internal reviewers are brave enough to point out flaws with this huge amount of pressure, it must be a really bad mess. Or they actually have some engineers left that found a backbone and are unwilling to be responsible for hundreds of people killed, no matter what management wants.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Comac is going to make a few billion dollars off this propaganda. The 73Max is a fine airplane; the problem is eastern pilots who are trained to trust the automation religiously. This is not a significantly different problem than the Asiana crash, where the pilots blindly let the airplane fly into the ground. Note that neither European nor American pilots have had a problem with noticing a minor trim problem and switching off the trim system until finished troubleshooting. That's very different than the Lion Air crew that took off with a known problem with a safety system, and still couldn't figure out that exact safety system was malfunctioning.
Simple: Trim wheel turns unexpectedly, turn off trim system. No different between the 707's I flew 40 years ago and a modern airbus, or any other airplane with electric trim.
What a concept. :/
As someone that has worked in both functional safety and off-highway vehicles.
How the fuck did this ever make it into production. Why is a 'second sensor' an upsell?
When given the option to completely update the cockpit to the latest and greatest with digital displays.
They chose to replicate the old mechanical dials so the pilots couldn't be retrained.
The entire thing from start to finish was rushed. Mechanical design comes first. There is no 'try and develop software in parallel'. A clean software design depends on a good mechanical design.
The plane should have been a white board redesign, it should have been balanced such that a pilot could fly it stable with no avionics. This isn't a jet fighter.
But it was rushed because Europe invested in R&D and beat them to economy routes. How much money did Boeing C-suites make before 2011? During the 2009 crash there was a hiring spree by some companies because the market was flooded with cheap, good engineers that just got laid off. Companies invested in talent. Did Boeing?
People died because... Boeing sat on R&D from post WWII while making a ton of money so when Airbus released a good plane they scrambled to retrofit an old design by putting huge engines on an airframe causing it to pitch up but to appease its clients it added software to mimic the old plane behavior and tested it themselves and told the FAA they promise they did it right.
More or less.
Who will write down the loss the 150 flight per day canceled for months. I assume airlines are insured for that risk, but still, the cost will be close to the billion USD.
MAX hidden settings
From what I understand, the planned change involves adding one more trim sensor and leaving the pilot to notice a "disagreement" light in the middle of trying to keep a flying bucking bronco stable. It's almost like they're ASKING for another major crash.
They added Clippy: "It looks like you are battling an aggressive autopilot. Would you like some help?"
Table-ized A.I.
In any normal flying, the trim is just a help. So even if this system trims badly, it should just annoy the pilot that has to countermand it. But apparently that was not possible, and that seems to be the real design issue. Nothing to do with sensors.
It would be like having automatic lane sensors in a car. If they go wrong the driver should be able to just grab the wheel and override them. The driver should NOT have to read some checklist in the manual to figure out which buttons to press to disable the system all while the car is heading towards a tree.
What a damn mess is all I can. So as a pilot you deal with a badly designed aircraft that has handling issues, which were addressed with software that fights you in deciding how to keep the aircraft in flight. Its like having two people try to drive a car at the same time.
How many hardware engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
None - we'll fix it in software.
How many software engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
None - we'll document a workaround.
How many tech writers does it take to change a light bulb?
None - the user can figure it out.
So in this case we have:
How many hardware engineers does it take to not crash an airplane with a faulty sensor?
None - we'll detect and avoid it in software.
How many software engineers does it take to not crash an airplane with a faulty sensor?
None - the pilots can be trained to disable the auto-trim mechanism.
How many trainers does it take to not crash an airplane with a faulty sensor?
None - the pilots can figure it out.
How many pilots who have no idea why the plane is reacting as it is does it take to crash an airplane with a faulty sensor?
None - the plane will do it for them.
(No, this isn't meant to be funny.)
Quattuor res in hoc mundo sanctae sunt: libri, liberi, libertas et liberalitas.
The reason aircraft software should always be able to be overriden by the pilot is that software can never be proven to work as specified.
In computability theory, the halting problem is the problem of determining, from a description of an arbitrary computer program and an input, whether the program will finish running (i.e., halt) or continue to run forever.
Alan Turing proved in 1936 that a general algorithm to solve the halting problem for all possible program-input pairs cannot exist.
The "MAX" in 737 Max is code for the aircraft being a substandard POS.
Kind of like Windows 10 "S" means you are getting a badly crippled, junk version of Windows 10.
n/t
https://slashdot.org/comments.... you lazy tosser.
And you didn't answer my questions: https://slashdot.org/comments....
Honestly the whole 737 scandal only raised a little concern. You make products for long enough one will crash and burn. Thinking that you can actually design, produce, and QA, and begin delivering a solution which lives depended in a matter of weeks, is a institutional cultural problem that will take a major effort to overhaul. Agile has its uses, this is a abomination of what looks to be a corporations attempt at it.
...would simply disable that computer driven bullshit system and simply set the trim appropriately.
Aviation gets better, one crash at a time.
The fuck up here is miniscule.
Cutting corners and not telling the pilots what's going on in their own aircraft, all to save a few bucks and kill hundreds of people. Is not a miniscule fuckup