Boeing's newest version of the 737 Max makes first flight

Has its supposedly new safety features been double checked, triple checked, adequately and appropriately?

Passengers' lives are valuable, so are the crew members..

What is tragedy without hubris?

So many seats, 230 seats is Iron Maiden class. Talk about how to make travel miserable.

I think I'l stick with Air Bus, if I have a choice. Dont trust Boeing after those scary crashes.

I think I'l stick with Air Bus, if I have a choice. Dont trust Boeing after those scary crashes.

Airbus, I call them Scarebus, has their own major problems. The A330 crash over New York (American Airlines Flight 587) is a case in point. The aircraft was below what is called "Maneuvering Speed", the speed at which it is safe to use full control deflections without over stressing the aircraft. However rudder deflection by the pilot led to the vertical stabilizer tearing off the aircraft. The pilot was blamed as is oft the case but a lot of us pilots were outraged because you should never be able to break the airplane with control movements if the airplane is below its published maneuvering speed. There is also Air France Flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris that crashed in the south Atlantic. The mishap investigations final report, released at a news conference on 5 July 2012, concluded that the aircraft crashed after temporary inconsistencies between the airspeed measurements probably caused by the aircraft's pitot tubes being obstructed by ice crystals. This in turn caused the autopilot to disconnect. The crew reacted incorrectly (keep in mind their instruments were now giving them inconsistent information that led to confusion in the cockpit) and ultimately caused the aircraft to enter an aerodynamic stall, from which it did not recover.

I used to smugly say "Scarebus, if it ain't Boeing we ain't going". Most of my own flight time is in big Boeing Vertol helicopters and I love them dearly. Best helicopters made. But now I am not so smug boarding a Boeing jet from say LA to Shanghai or even to Baltimore. More nerve wracking to fly now.

Desert Tortoise why are you so scared to fly commercial? I admit no pilot is happy being a passenger. The odds of getting in an accident are very low. Lower than your Boeing CH-47. The American Airlines Airbus A300B4-605R

Desert Tortoise why are you so scared to fly commercial? I admit no pilot is happy being a passenger. The odds of getting in an accident are very low. Lower than your Boeing CH-47. The American Airlines Airbus A300B4-605R

Probably because I don't have personal hands on with the equipment to know if it's well built, well maintained and I don't know what kinds of corners were cut along the way. To see what has gone on at Boeing bothers me. It is not how an airplane should be developed. It makes you ask what else is going on you don't know about. When I was flying helicopters I was there for maintenance, knew the maintainers personally, and knew the equipment was well cared for, plus we did detailed 45 minute pre-flight inspections. When flying commercial airplanes one assumes a level of honesty and professionalism, especially among the manufacturers. Events have proven that trust to be misplaced. So know my exhaust opening is chewing the seat upholstery from backing out of the gate to at least touchdown.

You need to relax the biggest problem in aircraft design is engineers. They think aircraft can be built to fly the aircraft better than the pilots. It is the heart of the 737 Max problems, taking away control from the pilots. The A300 crash was caused partly from corrosion. Air crashes are usually caused by more than a single factor. The 737 Max crashes happened because the planes flew themselves into terrain. You can blame the dead pilots until the cows come home but that does not alter these basic facts. The safety system is more dangerous than the problem. Boeing was too cheap to make a correct design. Boeing did not bring this to the attention of the airlines buying this model.

They think aircraft can be built to fly the aircraft better than the pilots. It is the heart of the 737 Max problems, taking away control from the pilots.

The problem with the 737 Max was created by putting ever larger engines on it to carry greater weights and a desire to save pilot training costs by avoiding a new type rating requirement. The original 737 didn't hang the engines from pylons like other jet airliners but integrated them smoothly into the underside of the wing. As the airplane was lengthened and carried more passengers ever larger engines were used. But the landing gear was only so long so ground clearance for larger engines became a problem. For the 737 Max the engines were so large in diameter they had to be mounted forward of the wing. This changed the airplane's flying characteristics. Specifically at certain high angles of attack the engine mounting negatively affects aircraft handling. Ideally the Max should have required pilots to obtain a type rating on it, but that would force airlines to pay a bunch of money on training up aircrews to legally fly it.  Instead Boeing did things in the software to make the Max fly like earlier models or at least close enough to permit pilots qualified on earlier models to fly the Max without a lot of expensive formal training and a Max specific type rating. Bad decision. One of the software "fixes" was designed to prevent a nose high situation that would get the plane into trouble due to the forward mounted engines. That feature malfunctioned and led to two tragic crashes.