Boeing likely really screwed up on the MCAS feature in the MAX series, but on balance they have always made excellent planes.
The increasing complexity of airliners is a serious issue to review. Airbus has had its share of computer related issues as well, such as the Air France crash off of Brazil. Automation is great until, like your PC or cellphone it goes wrong. There should always be a way for the pilots to assert ultimate control, and in a rapid fashion.
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To me and my family, Ethiopian Airlines brings sad news as I lost my dear brother aboard the fateful crash, on November 23,1996, following a hijacking incident, near the islands of Comoros. Our family has never recovered from that grief. In fact, BBC aired a documentary recreating the tragic crash. Yes, it was Boeing, a plane purportedly had capabilities to land on water, however, it didn't. Life is forgotten.
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@Stephen that was not Boeing's fault...the plane didn't land on water, it crashed on water, thanks to the hijackers. And there was another thing...if you have been one of the few paying attention to the safety briefing pre-flight safety briefing, you will notice an instruction to not inflate life vests until you are out of the airplane. That instruction stems from the experience of the 1996 crash. Many of the passengers survived the crash, put on the life vests and inflated them. As a result nobody could move in the cabin, and they went down with the plane. For that reason the policy on life vests is now different. I had a colleague on that flight, but he was luckier than your brother...
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@Frank Good summation of that incident. It was a crash not an attempted landing as was the "Miracle on the Hudson." And yes, the inflation of the life vests due to panic in the cabin contributed to the high rate of fatalities.
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I started reading the article and scrolled back up to see who was this well-informed reporter, seemingly knowledgeable of local affairs and sentiments too. No wonder, I thought, seeing the name and read the rest catching myself nodding throughout. Impressed by the article, which even managed to fit in memories of my own childhood, I concluded that it was reason enough to subscribe. This is what I want from a newspaper.
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Great reporting.
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Excellent article! A bit of background on the first 767's purchased by Ethiopian, and the importance of Ethiopian Airlines within the African airline industry. For several years during the Reagan Administration I was the State Dept. desk officer for Ethiopia. Ethiopian had outgrown its single aisle planes and wanted to buy two 767's. Senior Reagan Administration officials decided to block the sale to what at that time was a communist regime on a number of grounds; the main technical reason given was fear that the Russians would get their hands on the laser gyros in the planes and reverse engineer them. Boeing came to me pleading for a reconsideration, saying that if the sale were denied Ethiopian would be forced to buy similar aircraft from Airbus. The important element here was not just the two aircraft, it was Ethiopian's critical role as the African industry leader in maintaining the equipment of other African airlines, and in training their personnel. Boeing feared, with reason, a cascade effect; forcing Ethiopian to switch to Airbus would drive the rest of Africa to Airbus as well. It took months of effort but I was able to turn the decision around, and we sold the 767's, the first of many. I recently saw a new Ethiopian 777 out at Dulles boarding for its morning flight to Addis, and felt a burst of pride in this amazing airline and an amazing country. I was really glad I had been able to help save Ethiopian and other African clients for Boeing.
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"Last week, there was a collective sigh of relief when news came that the plane’s “black boxes” — the cockpit voice and flight data recorders — would go to France for analysis, not to Boeing’s home country."
I too, relaxed a bit when I saw that the recorder would not be scooped up by Boeing/FAA and the recorder's valuable information shrouded in US corp-fakespeak so that nobody would ever learn anything from the data.
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@Michael Under such unfortunate situations following an airline crash in the U.S., the black boxes go directly to the NTSB, not the aircraft manufacturer or the FAA. The NTSB and the FAA have had a contentious relationship as has the NTSB and some manufacturers. Following crashes or incidents, recommendations made by the NTSB to better improve flight safety have often been ignored by the FAA altogether.
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“Last week there was a collective sigh of relief when news came that the plane’s black boxes -the cockpit voice and flight data recorders- would go to France for analysis, not to Boeing’s home country.”
Of course there was. The “stand your ground” meetings between Donald Trump and Boeing’s CEO, led Boeing to ignore the most basic rules of “good” crisis management” e.g. Tylenol, and as a result the reputational damage accruing to Boeing from this tragedy is immeasurable. In a wider context, and taking into consideration, that it was only yesterday that the administration could be bothered to put someone in charge of the F.A.A., it is one more example of how America’s reputation for excellence in so many spheres is being diminished daily by this disastrous presidency.
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Wait a second. The American government gives out loans for countries to buy airplanes from private companies too foreign governments?
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Ethiopia is an ally and a partner in the War on Terror. It benefits both countries to see Ethiopia grow.
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@Sam
War on what? Congress didn't declare any war. This is nothing more than the state subsidizing a private company, something straight out of the Chinese playbook.
What a lovely piece, Selam, thank you so much. So lovingly written, and so true to how I have always felt about Ethiopian Airlines (I am Ethiopian American). It just made me so emotional, but also very grateful. Only an Ethiopian sis could have written it to affect me the way it did. Thank you, sis.
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There are precisely 2 companies in the world which make passenger airplanes (ignoring the below-10% share of the 3 others). Boeing has 12000 planes in service WW and Airbus about 10000.
Yes these crashes are bad and sad. But let's keep things in perspective. Americans have a 1 in 114 chance of dying in a car crash, according to the National Safety Council. The odds of dying in air and space transport incidents, which include private flights and air taxis, are 1 in 9,821. That’s almost three times better chances than you meeting your fate by choking on food. http://fortune.com/2017/07/20/are-airplanes-safer-than-cars/
And what exactly will Ethiopia do if doesn't like Boeing (or identically Airbus). Build its own aircraft? They have a few other things to tend to first. http://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/poverty/publication/ethiopia-poverty-assessment
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Your stats is likely correct. What is the conclusion? It surely is not, that there is any space to be lenient on Boeing-FAA relationship and the suspect, if not corrupt, certification process. It takes an honest commitment, critical attitude, money and political support to keep certification process valid and uncorrupted. Otherwise the stats are certain to deteriorate.
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Like great countries, great companies inspire pride. They make miraculous, quality products by doing what's right. No consideration to cutting corners and quick profits, the opposite of quality and afety. They're guided by integrity.
Seattleites were proud of Boeing for those reasons but felt when it moved to Chicago in 2001 profit and stockholders came first. Countries and companies can lose their way.
Rather than designing a new stable plane, they designed one that had to be unstable, hoping that could be controlled by software (would you buy a car like that?)
Imagine the horror of a correcting system run amock that jams and can't be turned off.
Or can anyone imagine any other explanation why the pilots couldn't turn it off during 6 minutes of porpoising, (auto system nosing down, pilot pulling up) and fly it normally?
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@Oreamnos
Actually it can be turned off though it takes a few steps. It emerged today that that was done on the Lion Air flight before its fatal crash.
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Boeing will suffer, rightly so. Don't forget that Airbus has had its accidents too. Actually statistically, Boeing planes have been safer to fly.
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As a pilot and engineer completely disgusted with Boeing and FAA. What an embarrassment to the country. What next?
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In the eyes of the world we've turned into a banana republic in so many respects...
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The cause of the accident will be known. There will be a fix. The plane will fly again. But Boeing's good reputation is a thing of the past. Along with that of the USA. Today Trump just nominated a person to head up the FAA. Yes, Trump. After 2 years he's nominated someone and we all know how he hires the best. Even if this person is highly qualified do you think anyone would believe it? And in the meantime I'm certain Airbus' sales teams are out in full force. Is it fair? Probably not. But like it or not there will not be much support for Boeing from your former allies.
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@RNS While aircraft buyers may rush to purchase from Airbus, they have a 6 year backlog. In addition, they too have had incidents caused by pilot error and "lack of control." After post 9/11 Airbus crash upon takeoff from JFK, it was incorrectly thought the cause was jet wake from 747 ahead. After the plane flew into the larger jet's wake, the first officer attempted to stabilize aircraft with alternating aggressive rudder inputs. Per NTSB, the force of air flowing against the moving rudder stressed the aircraft's vertical stabilizer, and eventually snapped it off, causing aircraft to lose control and crash. The NTSB concluded that enormous stress on the vertical stabilizer was due to the first officer's "unnecessary and excessive" rudder inputs, and not the wake turbulence caused by the 747. The NTSB further stated, "if the first officer had stopped making additional inputs, the aircraft would have stabilized". Contributing to these rudder pedal inputs were characteristics of Airbus A300-600 sensitive rudder system design and elements of the AA Advanced Aircraft Maneuvering Training Program.
More recently, Air France Airbus 330 crashed flying between Rio and Paris. BEA's report concluded aircraft crashed after temporary inconsistencies between the airspeed measurements caused autopilot to disconnect, after which crew reacted incorrectly and ultimately caused the aircraft to enter an aerodynamic stall, from which it did not recover.
Aircraft Flaws or Poor Training?
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@Martha MacC Good question. But it comes down to who do you trust? And like it or not the US' word these days is worth nothing. Sad, but true.
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Airbus planes also crash.A good number have.These are complex mechanical objects.Instead of jumping to attack Boeing, a company with a very long history of building safe aircraft, how about getting all the facts straight.Then the problem can be addressed.
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Ok , let’s get all the facts straight. Two of these planes crashed within months under similar circumstances. Boeing deemed software as superior to humans to fly the planes. Those are the facts. Next question.
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@Michael
There are more facts. Boeing NEVER should have used an angle of attack sensor as a single point of failure. It should have had a back up. This just is not done in aviation.
Also Boeing was negligent in not telling the pilots how to deal with a computer taking over the plane.
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@Opie Taylor Question. These flying machines generate tons of carbon; will efficient clean mass-transport ever take-off ?
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Boeing has lost the trust of the world. They embraced greed for profits, human lives for billions of dollars in blood money.
I will never trust the 737 Max 8. This plane has an inherently flawed design (and overly powerful engines) that was Boeing knew pushed the bleeding edges of conservative engineering. I fully expect we will hear from even more engineers from the FAA/Boeing (same entity now apparently) who warned Boeing not to keep pushing.
Boeing stock I hear is a “bargain” now. Naw. Ignore the Wall Street hucksters. They told us everything was fine just before the crash in 2008.
What Boeing doesn’t get (yet) is that their betrayal of their decades of public trust is now as empty as the grounded planes. No one will want to fly these 737 Max 8s no matter how they spin goofy software fixes.
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After one plane crash in the country, and before the actual cause is determined? Ok, people. Pilot training requirements are one thing, but nationalistic drum beating is another. Remember, Boeing is a major American institution, too big to fail, older than aviation regulations, and fully devoted to safety.
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@Chris McClure
Nonsense! No corporation is too big to fail. Whom exactly do you have in mind when you say when you say about Boeing "too big to fail"?
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@Bill N. Is there another aircraft manufacturer on the horizon that US airlines can turn to for new fleet of planes. NO.
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it's called: "letting the fox mind the chickens." Not structured to end well
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The loss of life is devastating.
Nonetheless, the experts must be allowed to complete the investigation. Nobody knows the cause right now and speculation and prematurely assigning blame doesn’t help the situation.
In this case, the media does bear some responsibility for publishing incomplete information. There are potentially many things that went wrong.
Fortunately, airplane crashes are increasingly rare, but when they occur, the outcome is massive and terrible.
Sincere condolences to those who lost family and friends.
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Boeing must do right by this proud nation.
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Not only have Ethiopian nationals long recognized the quality as well as the economic value of this airline. So have international agencies like the UN, which (as the passenger list of Flight 302 sadly demonstrates) regularly uses it. And Kenyans and Canadians far outnumbered the Ethiopians on board.
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