Internal Boeing Emails Claim 777X Shares MAX Problem

[dufus]

 

Internal emails from Boeing staff members working on the 737 MAX were made public earlier this month have revealed new safety problems for the company's flagship 777X, a long-range, wide-body, twin-engine passenger jet, currently in development that is expected to replace the aging 777-200LR and 777-300ER fleets, reported The Telegraph.

 

Already, damning emails released via a U.S. Senate probe describes problems during the MAX development and qualification process. The emails also highlight how Boeing employees were troubled by the 777X – could be vulnerable to technical issues. 

 

Emails dated from June 2018, months before the first MAX crash, said the "lowest ranking and most unproven" suppliers used on the MAX program were being shifted towards the 777X program. 

 

The email further said the "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."

Another Boeing employee warned about cost-cutting measures via selecting the "lowest-cost suppliers" for both MAX and 777X programs.

 

"We put ourselves in this position by picking the lowest-cost supplier and signing up to impossible schedules. Why did the lowest ranking and most unproven suppliers receive the contract? Solely based on the bottom dollar. Not just the Max but also the 777X! Supplier management drives all these decisions."

 

Like the MAX, the 777X is an update of an outdated airframe from decades ago, which is an attempt by Boeing to deliver passenger jets that are more efficient and provide better operating economics for airlines. 

 

Back in September, we noted how the door of a new 777X flew off the fuselage while several FAA inspectors were present to evaluate a structural test. 

 

Boeing's problem could stem from how it used the "lowest-cost suppliers" to develop high-tech planes on old airframes to compete with Airbus. The result has already been devastating: two MAX planes have crashed, killing 346 people, due to a malfunctioning flight control system, and 777X failing a structural ground test. 

 

Boeing's C-suite executives push for profitability (at the apparent expense of safety) has, by all appearances, been a disaster; sacrificing the safety of the planes to drive sales higher to unlock tens of billions of dollars in stock buybacks - that would allow executives to dump their stock options at record high stock prices.

 

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[mp68terr]

One more bad news for the passengers.

One more good news for airbus.

[Reefa]

Experts Don’t Know Why Boeing 777 Doused Children With Jet Fuel

 

On Tuesday, a Boeing 777 dumped jet fuel on at least 60 people — including 20 children — just prior to making an emergency landing in Los Angeles.

 

While dumping fuel isn’t entirely unheard of, the Delta pilots’ decision to do so over a populated area and from an elevation of just 2,300 feet has left experts baffled.

 

“I’m just puzzled why these folks decided to do it this way,”  Ross Aimer, a retired United Airlines pilot who now serves as CEO of Aero Consulting Experts, told NBC News.

 

Some planes can take off at a higher weight than they can safely land. That isn’t usually an issue, though, because the plane will burn jet fuel during a flight, thereby dropping enough weight for safe landing.

 

If a plane needs to make an emergency landing, however, it‘ll sometimes dump fuel to reach the lower weight faster. Typically they do so from a higher altitude, in which case the fuel evaporates before ever reaching the ground. If that’s not an option, they may do over over a less-populated area, such as an ocean.

 

Delta Flight 89 was supposed to be a 13-hour nonstop flight from Los Angeles to Shanghai, but instead it landed back at LAX just 25 minutes after takeoff. The airline’s statement to BuzzFeed News that the fuel dump was “required as part of normal procedure to reach a safe landing weight” makes sense, then — the plane probably still had a lot of fuel onboard.

 

But what experts can’t seem to figure out is why the Delta pilots decided to dump the fuel when and where they did — and why they didn’t inform air traffic controllers about the decision.

 

“The question investigators are going to ask is that if you’re going to dump fuel, why didn’t you advise air traffic control, and why didn’t you go where fuel dumping is approved, which would not be over a highly populated area?” John Cox, head of aviation safety consulting company Safety Operating Systems, told NBC. “If you had an on-board fire or something like that, it makes absolute sense to do that. But this was not that case.”

 

The Federal Aviation Administration said on Tuesday that it’s investigating the incident — so hopefully answers to those questions are forthcoming. For now, though, we can be thankful that none of the people hit by the shower of jet fuel were seriously injured.

 

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