That's a disingenuous headline (I blame the Telegraph).<p>> In an email from June 2018, before the first Max crash, one Boeing worker wrote: “Best part is we are re-starting this whole thing with the 777X with the same supplier and have signed up to an even more aggressive schedule.”<p>> Another member of staff warns about a relentless cost focus...<p>> Last September, the 777X suffered a setback when it failed a ground test of its strength, suffering an explosive decompression that tore the fuselage and blew off a passenger door.<p>None of those are what I would call the "Max problem," (I'd consider that to be MCAS) but there does seem to be a systemic problem off cost cutting and aggressive deadlines.
If William Langeweische's NYT article from last September (<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/18/magazine/boeing-737-max-crashes.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/18/magazine/boeing-737-max-c...</a>) is accurate, Boeing is scrambling to make a transition from selling airplanes requiring extremely high pilot skill ("airmanship", Langeweische calls it) to requiring medium pilot skill. They're trying to make the transition due to competition from Airbus. They're partly using public relations and market position to do it. "No transition training needed to fly this differently-shaped airplane!"<p>It's not terribly surprising this is causing all kinds of upheavals at Boeing.<p>Richard Feynman is right again. "For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled."<p>Boeing changed my life. My family traveled a lot when I was a little kid. The advent of the 707 meant we no longer had to spend five days on a ship in the North Atlantic to get from Europe to New York or vice versa. I sure hope they can pull their company out of its present poorly controlled descent.
It's not just planes; I've noticed a lot of things seem to get better over time, then take a nosedive (pun not intended). I wonder if it's an inherent property of systems to do this, or if it's the result of some perverse incentives to have "progress" at all costs.
Boeing is the stock with the biggest weight within the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Trump often uses this index as a public measure of his personal success.<p>Is it too much to assume that the government would try to figure out some rescue operations (whatever they may look like) to save Boeing financially in case that this is required?
One reason for the trade dispute with the EU is Airbus.
I can’t read the whole article because of the paywall.<p>But from the lead in it doesn’t look like it really is ‘the same issues’ as in problems with a lack of redundant sensor and overly aggressive correction due to engines that are too big.<p>Anyone whose read the whole thing care to correct me?
On another note: I just wish if every website would charge based on pay-per-read (e.g. $0.50/article) instead of forcing me to register or start a free trial or pay for a monthly subscription.
These articles are getting a little tiresome. Private enterprise is about competition and cost reduction. That’s what drives improvement, innovation, and efficiency, and it’s what differentiates private enterprise from government spending, which is about justifying why things need to be so expensive.<p>Yes, Boeing was too aggressive about reducing cost to compete with Airbus and they need some major reform because hundreds of people are dead. But let’s not forget that this drive towards cost reduction is what still allows you today fly across the country in perfect safety for $300. All these people saying “Of course Boeing should have designed a totally new plane from scratch with quadruple-redundant systems, only the most experienced factory workers to build it, all parts made out of unicorn tears for safety’s sake, etc.” have a misguided view of how engineering is done.<p>Perfectly reasonable decisions by Boeing to try to reduce costs for their customers and passengers are now being characterized negatively, merely because they are intended to reduce cost. People don’t seem to realize that it’s easy to build an expensive airplane - the hard part of engineering is not always choosing the easy, expensive option.