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Ethiopian Airlines Crew Followed Procedures Before Boeing Max Crash, Early Report Says (latimes.com)

The pilots of a doomed Ethiopian Airlines jet followed all of Boeing's recommended procedures when the plane started to nose dive but still couldn't save it, according to findings from a preliminary report released Thursday by the Ethiopian government. From a report: The plane crashed just six minutes after taking off from Addis Ababa, killing all 157 people on board. The report, based on flight data and cockpit voice recorders on the Boeing 737 Max 8, was not released in full. Boeing declined to comment pending its review of the report on the March 10 crash. The Max 8 has been under scrutiny since a Lion Air flight crashed off the coast of Indonesia under similar circumstances in October. Thursday's revelations raise questions about repeated assertions by Boeing and U.S. regulators that pilots could regain control in some emergencies by following steps that include turning off an anti-stall system designed specifically for the Max, known by its acronym, MCAS. Investigators are looking into the role of MCAS, whose functions include automatically lowering the plane's nose to prevent an aerodynamic stall. The Max has been grounded worldwide pending a software fix that Boeing is rolling out, which still needs to be approved by the Federal Aviation Administration and other regulators. Further reading: Flawed Analysis, Failed Oversight: How Boeing, FAA Certified the Suspect 737 MAX Flight Control System.

3 of 193 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Terrible plane by TigerPlish · · Score: 4, Insightful

    should have bought AirBus

    AF 443.

    The Paris Air Show lawnmower, AF 296 (And in that one, investigators allegedly altered blackbox data to frame the pilot because heavens no, we can't have FBW impuned in the international spotlight after crashing 1 of 3 at the world's biggest airshow. Vive la France!)

    The sad truth is that now Boeing is just as shitty as Airbus, because Boeing now behaves like McDonnel Douglas did. Why? It's Douglas "leadership" that took over Boeing post-merger, and now Boeing is accountant-driven, not engineer-driven. Anytime you subjugate engineering to the beancounters this happens.

    I am so dissapointed with Boeing ever since the slippage started on the 787. The rollout for that one was of an empty shell, unlike all other rollouts before it. Shameful. Live it up, shareholders, live it up, your short-term greed fucked up what was America's best, most visible product.

    Maybe it's time to buy Sukhoi. Or maybe Lockheed can be persuaded, they've not built any jetliners since the L1011.

    --
    The "Civilized World" jumped the shark ca. 1973.
  2. Re:Boeing Deserves to Pay for This by Streetlight · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Perhaps the FAA Administrator who made these changes should be forced to resign. This administration has had enough turnover that the President should be capable of appointing new leadership quickly.

    The replacement administrator would likely be the Boeing's chief lobbyist.

    --
    In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. George Orwell
  3. Re:Terrible plane by Kartu · · Score: 1, Insightful

    The sad truth is that now Boeing is just as shitty as Airbus

    Now I need to know when did Airbus:

    1) Design a system which can decide to nosedive the plan
    2) Make it depend on a single fucking sensor
    3) Have guy who worked for airbus before, but is now owrking for the government, claim that sensor was supposed to fail "only" in 1 out of 100'000 cases hence it was OK to have "terminate this plane" feature depend only on that single sensor
    4) After letting all that shit into production and actually killing people pretend nothing is wrong and do fucking nothing

    I won't even dive into how the fuck is deadly piece of crap feature like that accompanied by only a fucking PDF being sent to pilots to read.

    PS
    Oh, and no more "authorities faked data" BS please.