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Being 737 max8....an explanation and asking should it ever been flying?

Being 737 max8....an explanation and asking should it ever been flying?

So to basically some this up, this wouldn’t have happened in the US so the response is completely ridiculous and overblown. But hey let’s drive a few airlines and a huge employer and exporter 20% down. I’ll keep buying the stock on the dips.


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Rusty Dave said:
Well I'm Canadian and can truly only speak for the Canadian system however obviously being in the industry for 20+ years, I have a good understanding of what's going on worldwide in terms of training and standards.
Here's the lowdown as I see it. Certain countries train to a higher standard. It's just the way it is. China, for example, has a massive pilot shortage and has been head hunting guys like myself and throwing ridiculous amounts of money at us to go and fly over there. I looked into it and I was impressed with the training, standards and regulations that govern their pilots and aviation industry. I'm not going over there as I'd like to keep my family but it's just to give you an example. Other countries are known to not really train to a higher standard. They have standards but it's basically trained to the minimum regulations and requirements. Not many but they're out there. That being said, the problems that arise from this is when you start throwing inexperienced crews on high performance airplanes and don't provide them with the proper tools for ultimate success. That can happen anywhere or at any airline. You don't hear much about that around here because of the ridiculously high training standards most airlines have in North America. Don't get me wrong, there is a high standard of training in most parts of the world. Just not everywhere. Economics usually play a role in that.

The other issue and the far greater threat to aviation safety is the massive pilot shortage looming right now. For years, becoming an airline pilot was a long process. You had to spend upwards of 100k to get all your licensing and then make minimum wage for a few years working as a pilot to gain experience. Only after you got to a major airline and spent a few years there did you start to make good money. Before that it was a struggle. So the industry is paying for that now. For years, a US regional carrier paid it's junior pilots peanuts. I'm talking like 15k a year. How the hell are you supposed to make a living like that? It was simple supply and demand. More pilots than jobs. Why would anyone spend the next 10 years of their life living in poverty? So now that demand exceeds supply, you have positions available to inexperienced pilots that were never present before and junior pilots filling the roles that were reserved for more experienced pilots in the past as airlines are forced to put someone in the flight deck with less experience.
Now carriers are starting to wise up. Regional airlines are starting to pay a lot more to retain it's pilots and attract pilots from flight schools and smaller operators. Bigger airlines that feed from it's regional pilot feeder, are offering better incentives to keep experienced crews at these feeders before moving them up.
This shortage is worldwide. That's why when you see the Ethiopian accident, the first officer had about 400 hours total time. That's peanuts. The industry as a whole will suffer from this inexperience until it catches up on the supply and demand chain.
And to answer your question about more experienced crews handling the situation better, the answer is yes. The MCAS system was more or less briefly described to us as we started flying the max, however a runaway stabilizer is a runaway stabilizer. It's doing the opposite of what you want it to do. Control the airplane, run the checklist and go from there. It happened to several US carriers without incident.

I'm going golfing now and going to enjoy my round.
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thanks for that honest response and information. And good luck for the round.

Not just to you but of course to anyone in the conversation. The experience pool we will have no choice as that just simply has to work itself out through time as time is the only thing that will eventually work it out. But the training issues? Imo there should be no international minimum vs higher training standards but imo "only" the highest training standards should be what international minimum is. Anything less should never be acceptable and that should be global.

Honestly thats a pretty scary thought. For anyone traveling globaly we should all be entitles to pilots that have the same highest level of training as the next. As very many airlines partner up in flight itineraries travelers often find they book with a given airline only to be actually boarding a plane of another. I mean one book a multi city trip to italy via lets say Delta. yet you find the flight on one of the legs is actually on Alitialia and one of the return legs is on perhaps air france or whatever other airlines there might be is the case. point is you simply dont know how much more or any less capable the peoples hands your life is in are for flying you. There truly needs to be one "high" standard with no room for minimum in one place but higher in the next. its honestly unsettling to know a difference in training does exist.

As ive indicated a couple times, you cant falt for experience when too many just dont have enough yet. only time breads experience. the onyly thing you can do is mix and match experience with inexperience as best a carrier can in each plane in order to spread the experience best as possible throughout the fleet. But training? thats something where blame can go because that imo isnt excusable. Training should globally be the same highest everywhere.

just perhaps this whole thing is why Airbus is a bit more automation oriented than Boeing is. That then may be more attractive to airlines that understand thier staff is not the highest trained and so they need to and want to rely more on the automation. Im just guessing and suggesting on the ideology there. But the downside is that when automation fails and the human factor isnt suited for the situational problems you end up with disasters.

But also this now turns into a mini cold war. Blame the US(FAA) and the US aircraft maker (Boeing). But dont ever look at your own airlines and/or countries less than higher standards pilot training process. Im not saying there wasnt any mistake by Boeing here. Just that there is not going to be any ownership taken to the fact that lessor skilled pilots also lead to the crashes much like the Brazillian airbus one did. As mentioned, ruunaway stabilzer did happen to other pilots before but they managed thier way through it. While the intial problem may be linked to an oversight by Boeing , it may not be unfair to suggest it very possible the pilots were not adequate to asses and handle the out of the norm situation. Who is to take ownership of that? No one?
 
Rusty Dave said:
Well I'm Canadian and can truly only speak for the Canadian system however obviously being in the industry for 20+ years, I have a good understanding of what's going on worldwide in terms of training and standards.
Here's the lowdown as I see it. Certain countries train to a higher standard. It's just the way it is. China, for example, has a massive pilot shortage and has been head hunting guys like myself and throwing ridiculous amounts of money at us to go and fly over there. I looked into it and I was impressed with the training, standards and regulations that govern their pilots and aviation industry. I'm not going over there as I'd like to keep my family but it's just to give you an example. Other countries are known to not really train to a higher standard. They have standards but it's basically trained to the minimum regulations and requirements. Not many but they're out there. That being said, the problems that arise from this is when you start throwing inexperienced crews on high performance airplanes and don't provide them with the proper tools for ultimate success. That can happen anywhere or at any airline. You don't hear much about that around here because of the ridiculously high training standards most airlines have in North America. Don't get me wrong, there is a high standard of training in most parts of the world. Just not everywhere. Economics usually play a role in that.

The other issue and the far greater threat to aviation safety is the massive pilot shortage looming right now. For years, becoming an airline pilot was a long process. You had to spend upwards of 100k to get all your licensing and then make minimum wage for a few years working as a pilot to gain experience. Only after you got to a major airline and spent a few years there did you start to make good money. Before that it was a struggle. So the industry is paying for that now. For years, a US regional carrier paid it's junior pilots peanuts. I'm talking like 15k a year. How the hell are you supposed to make a living like that? It was simple supply and demand. More pilots than jobs. Why would anyone spend the next 10 years of their life living in poverty? So now that demand exceeds supply, you have positions available to inexperienced pilots that were never present before and junior pilots filling the roles that were reserved for more experienced pilots in the past as airlines are forced to put someone in the flight deck with less experience.
Now carriers are starting to wise up. Regional airlines are starting to pay a lot more to retain it's pilots and attract pilots from flight schools and smaller operators. Bigger airlines that feed from it's regional pilot feeder, are offering better incentives to keep experienced crews at these feeders before moving them up.
This shortage is worldwide. That's why when you see the Ethiopian accident, the first officer had about 400 hours total time. That's peanuts. The industry as a whole will suffer from this inexperience until it catches up on the supply and demand chain.
And to answer your question about more experienced crews handling the situation better, the answer is yes. The MCAS system was more or less briefly described to us as we started flying the max, however a runaway stabilizer is a runaway stabilizer. It's doing the opposite of what you want it to do. Control the airplane, run the checklist and go from there. It happened to several US carriers without incident.

I'm going golfing now and going to enjoy my round.
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400 hours is just insane. 400 hours in the aircraft or 400 total hours?
 
Wake said:
400 hours is just insane. 400 hours in the aircraft or 400 total hours?
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I believe it was 400 total.

Heck, I have 60 total hours, and don’t even have my private. A US pilot is limited to 1000 hrs per year, so that’ll tell you how few hours that actually is.
 
Being 737 max8....an explanation and asking should it ever been flying?

400 hours total.

If any of you are concerned about travelling abroad, check to see if the airline is ICAO certified.

Here’s a good article on it:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/29/travel/how-safe-is-your-airline.html

My last trip the first officer and I had 23000 hours between us. Some airlines may have 2500 up front. Not much. That being said I commute on our feeder to get to and from my base in Vancouver. We joke that the kids are flying us because they’re young and not overly experienced. Now I’m ok with that because I know the training and standards that WestJet provides them is top notch and exceeds the normal standard. It’s the nature of our industry with inexperience pilots at the feeders. The training they receive gets them ready for the pressures of the job and experience comes with time.
 
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Being 737 max8....an explanation and asking should it ever been flying?

Hmm. Data basically is pointing to the crew screwing up after a possible bird strike. That’s quite a long ways from what has been put forth previously. Let alone the basis of this thread as a “flawed design”.

Will wait for further clarification on what appears to be Ethiopian Airlines lying to essentially cover their butts for crew inaction and not following procedure.

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Girardcorp said:
Hmm. Data basically is pointing to the crew screwing up after a possible bird strike. That’s quite a long ways from what has been put forth previously. Let alone the basis of this thread as a “flawed design”.

Will wait for further clarification on what appears to be Ethiopian Airlines lying to essentially cover their butts for crew inaction and not following procedure.

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Well, I'm not ready to say the Max is a flawed design. I think that Boeing made some decisions that shouldn't have been made (single AOA input to MCAS rather than both, display indications being options), but that doesn't necessarily make it a flawed design. Heck, the F-117 Nighthawk (first stealth fighter) has all kinds of computer systems that keep it in stable flight, so an airframe / engine combo with certain software requirements don't set off alarms for me.

Not surprised the air carrier is trying to protect its crew and their actions. The bird strike theory has come to light after prelim reading of the FDR, so it's not unusual that it hasn't been on the news from the beginning.
 
Being 737 max8....an explanation and asking should it ever been flying?

tomcat said:
Well, I'm not ready to say the Max is a flawed design. I think that Boeing made some decisions that shouldn't have been made (single AOA input to MCAS rather than both, display indications being options), but that doesn't necessarily make it a flawed design. Heck, the F-117 Nighthawk (first stealth fighter) has all kinds of computer systems that keep it in stable flight, so an airframe / engine combo with certain software requirements don't set off alarms for me.

Not surprised the air carrier is trying to protect its crew and their actions. The bird strike theory has come to light after prelim reading of the FDR, so it's not unusual that it hasn't been on the news from the beginning.
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As an engineer, I’d say the two things you pointed out are a flawed system design, but the good news is it can be fixed. The single point of failure just seems like an insane design decision for something when the result of failure could be catastrophic.

I agree that there’s zero issues with having a computer run part of the show to gain things like efficiency or something you couldn’t get otherwise, but it’s important to get that stuff right. And despite the exact cause of each of these accidents, I think the system is working - they’re looking at possible causes and fixing them, resulting in greater safety.
 
Being 737 max8....an explanation and asking should it ever been flying?

Interesting theories popping up in the net. Birdstrike now? Doesn’t change anything. If a birdstrike damaged the AofA after takeoff, the MCAS would’ve started doing its thing. Action by the crew: runaway stabilizer emergency checklist, click off autopilot, disengage autothrottles, control pitch and disconnect the electric/autopilot trim switches.

Still doesn’t change anything in this accident. Improper checklist action by the crew (didn’t turn off switches until after the 3rd nose down event (according to a preliminary report) and a faulty MCAS system as discussed in previous posts.

As for another report that says these sensors are prone to failure, I call BS. I’ve NEVER had an AofA failure in over 9000 hours and 17 years on 737’s.
 
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Being 737 max8....an explanation and asking should it ever been flying?

And to put the theory that the MAX design is flawed to bed, let’s say contrary to the media reports that aim to scare the general public, the MAX is a great aircraft as said by every pilot I know (including myself) that operates them.

It’s a flawed MCAS system that will be fixed.
 
The word flawed can certainly be a subjective one. It depends how one views things. If by its own design an aircraft has the potential to pitch itself up more than commanded to and (when in certain situations) could possibly lead to an unsafe angle where corrective action is required (or as in this case a system was even installed to correct it), then implying that's a flaw I feel is still a fair assessment. Just how bad of a flaw it is?.....Is certainly subjective and debatable. But blaming this for any crash? Well, That would have to be left up to determining everything about the events that lead to any crash. It appears in this case (regardless what caused the aoa device to fail) that proper piloted actions should have and could have been different which would have saved the plane (or maybe even both planes).

But its likely that is something that (even if found to be the case) woiuldnt in this case be something atop any headlines. Instead it will likely be Boeing and the FAA that will take the heat. And honestly Id like to see the truth (if it is determined as such) about the inadequate pilots being to blame. If pilot actions indeed were found to be flawed then Boeing and the FAA should stand firm on those facts and so should the US Govnt since the FAA is part of it and since Boeing is a US company. And Id also like to see higher global pilot training standards as a result of this too. Lets not worry who we might insult and let the truth be told and known for what it is whatever that might end up being.
 
I don't know a lot about flying but I've found this entire conversation fascinating.
 
@rustydave, just saw the Canadian Transport Minister is suggesting that sim training (for the MAX fix) will be required up there, even if the US doesn't require it. You think that'll fly, or will he give in to the push to get them back in the air quicker?
 
tomcat said:
@rustydave, just saw the Canadian Transport Minister is suggesting that sim training (for the MAX fix) will be required up there, even if the US doesn't require it. You think that'll fly, or will he give in to the push to get them back in the air quicker?
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The US carriers have cancelled the Max flights throughout the highly profitable summer months. So it looks like this will take a while including extra pilot training. Sim training will probably not be required simply because there is not enough Max specific sims operating right now.
 
I know we pulled them out through the summer, simply because of how difficult it is to cover their flights on short notice. I'd much rather they be overly conservative and pull them through August and then we have a fleet of spares should they return earlier than have to dig through this schedule daily and find the low counts to cancel.

Any idea how long it takes us to pull them out of storage and get them up and running once things are good again?
 
tomcat said:
I know we pulled them out through the summer, simply because of how difficult it is to cover their flights on short notice. I'd much rather they be overly conservative and pull them through August and then we have a fleet of spares should they return earlier than have to dig through this schedule daily and find the low counts to cancel.

Any idea how long it takes us to pull them out of storage and get them up and running once things are good again?
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Not sure.

Most carriers didn’t include them in their fleet plans for the summer because they need certainties to plan their schedules. This is done months in advance and regardless if the max comes back sooner, the airlines can’t count on this for planning purposes.
 
tomcat said:
I know we pulled them out through the summer, simply because of how difficult it is to cover their flights on short notice. I'd much rather they be overly conservative and pull them through August and then we have a fleet of spares should they return earlier than have to dig through this schedule daily and find the low counts to cancel.

Any idea how long it takes us to pull them out of storage and get them up and running once things are good again?
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They are being maintained as part of the long term storage program. It should only take a scheduled maintenance visit to bring them up to time in the maintenance check program. They would be back in the fleet within days when given the ok.
 
Ok ,...so Dave (or perhaps anyone with the experience) I have come across a new article of news (if correct) that explains more detail of what the pilots did as they fought with the situation. In liught of this I have re-read your posts in this thread where you touch on some technical actions that possibly could have been made and/or how more experienced or better trained pilots may have done differently. Given this article linked here if accurate https://www.seattletimes.com/busine...ts-fight-against-the-737-max-flight-controls/ interesting enough it mentions something you mentioned about how trimming manually at speed would been nearly impossible. And Id like to know in your opinion and from your experience and expertise and based on the info in the artical if any things were overlooked or should have, would have been done differently by more experienced pilots to save the plane.
 
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rollin said:
Ok ,...so Dave (or perhaps anyone with the experience) I have come across a new article of news (if correct) that explains more detail of what the pilots did as they fought with the situation. In liught of this I have re-read your posts in this thread where you touch on some technical actions that possibly could have been made and/or how more experienced or better trained pilots may have done differently. Given this article linked here if accurate https://www.seattletimes.com/busine...ts-fight-against-the-737-max-flight-controls/ interesting enough it mentions something you mentioned about how trimming manually at speed would been nearly impossible. And Id like to know in your opinion and from your experience and expertise and based on the info in the artical if any things were overlooked or should have, would have been done differently by more experienced pilots to save the plane.
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Get ready to roll to Hawaii tonight. I’ll answer this for you tomorrow by the pool.

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Being 737 max8....an explanation and asking should it ever been flying?

Ok. So I hate armchair piloting accidents because like everything else it’s easy to critique after the fact about actions taken.

The point is not letting the aircraft trim itself to the point that at high speeds you’re unable to counteract and move the trim wheel. From prelim reports there were several AND (aircraft nose down events) commanded by the MCAS prior to the pilots shutting off the switches. Now there’s stall alarms, high speed clacker noises, some erroneous instrumentation due to the AofA sensor being messed up. So lots going on and could be overwhelming for a less experienced crew however rule number 1 is fly the airplane. If this airplane is not doing what I want, how do I fix it.? Twice a year I’m in our simulators for recurrent training. That means 17 years of sim sessions at 4-5 days a year. Plus initial sim training on both the older 200 and current 37 sims. That adds another 20 or so sessions. That puts me well over 100 simulator sessions at 3-4 hours a piece. That’s a lot of emergency and non normal training. Plus 9000 flying the airplane. I’ve seen a lot.

So I guess what I’m saying is that there’s been several runaway stabilizer events before. All handled wonderfully by the crews. The MCAS system was new and not well explained to operators or crew. That’s on Boeing. But a runaway stabilizer whether it’s an electrical trim malfunction or MCAS doing it still requires the same action from the crew. And we’ve practiced it a lot in the sim and we will be doing more after these latest events. Experience counts.
 
Aloha.....lol
Hop over to Maui for a round at kaanapali. But Im guessing you just need rest for a return flight.

Thanks for the response (its interesting stuff). Please keep in mind that any my questions are not to be taken as though Ive been or would be challenging you in a negative way. But are simply just (for myself or anyone else) to help me better understand things. And also to help me form opinion about the accident/s. i think thats important to know while we see many point blame at Boeing and or the FAA as well. Imo if training (or lack of) is to be in part to blame then thats what should be known to the world and the industry.

So from your post....it seems (and i assume you read the article) pilot error may have occurred was to allow the aircraft to get to unsafe trim angles to begin with? And at that speed would been imposible to manually trim. Im not really understanding because the MCAS (as per faulty sensor) wanted to trim down (and did) even though the plane may not been at unsafe angle. Of course the pilots fight controls to bring it back up. And this apparently ends up being a loosing up/down battle. But where/what exactly should they done differently? if they couldnt manually fight the trim wheel due to forces, then how were they to stop this? according to the article, they turned electronic control off but after not being able to control the pitching, they turned it back on again which just reengaged the MCAS again to only pitch down again. Was there a way to gain electronic control while disabling MCAS? It seems that this would been the only way to fly the plane safely. Is that where the error occurred? and this would then take us back to the beginning where disabling MCAS would have been the one thing they should have done. It doesnt seem as though anything else would have worked. Should the pilots (even if not specifically trained to shut MCAS) known to do this anyway and how to do it anyway? is that where lack of higher training rears its ugly truth? And was there also any other action/s that they should have done. Again im just trying to better understand and unfortunately trying to squeeze your brain in order to do it....lol.
 
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Being 737 max8....an explanation and asking should it ever been flying?

rollin said:
Aloha.....lol
Hop over to Maui for a round at kaanapali. But Im guessing you just need rest for a return flight.

Thanks for the response (its interesting stuff). Please keep in mind that any my questions are not to be taken as though Ive been or would be challenging you in a negative way. But are simply just (for myself or anyone else) to help me better understand things. And also to help me form opinion about the accident/s. i think thats important to know while we see many point blame at Boeing and or the FAA as well. Imo if training (or lack of) is to be in part to blame then thats what should be known to the world and the industry.

So from your post....it seems (and i assume you read the article) pilot error may have occurred was to allow the aircraft to get to unsafe trim angles to begin with? And at that speed would been imposible to manually trim. Im not really understanding because the MCAS (as per faulty sensor) wanted to trim down (and did) even though the plane may not been at unsafe angle. Of course the pilots fight controls to bring it back up. And this apparently ends up being a loosing up/down battle. But where/what exactly should they done differently? if they couldnt manually fight the trim wheel due to forces, then how were they to stop this? according to the article, they turned electronic control off but after not being able to control the pitching, they turned it back on again which just reengaged the MCAS again to only pitch down again. Was there a way to gain electronic control while disabling MCAS? It seems that this would been the only way to fly the plane safely. Is that where the error occurred? and this would then take us back to the beginning where disabling MCAS would have been the one thing they should have done. It doesnt seem as though anything else would have worked. Should the pilots (even if not specifically trained to shut MCAS) known to do this anyway and how to do it anyway? is that where lack of higher training rears its ugly truth? And was there also any other action/s that they should have done. Again im just trying to better understand and unfortunately trying to squeeze your brain in order to do it....lol.
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You don’t actually turn MCAS off. You turn the switches to the electric/autopilot trim off which disables that system. Once off, you leave it off and fly the airplane with manual trim. It will fly perfectly fine with manual trim.
 
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