Is a Boeing 737 MAX the safest plane in service?

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"several years ago, Boeing initiated a “Verification Optimization” program that resulted in eliminating thousands of quality inspections on each airplane, relying instead on mechanics self-verifying that they performed their work properly."

In my opinion, this is an incredibly stupid and unacceptable approach to inspection. It is inherently unsafe and should be illegal, and Boeing should be made to cease and desist from this program immediately.

 

So, last Sunday I flew to the West Coast on a Southwest Max 8. Plane was about 30% full. I went down the aisle and a stew was standing in the row by the overwing emergency doors. I said "I'd really like to sit in this row. Can you guarantee me the door wont fly off?" She had a good sense of humor and just smiled and said "Thats a different model".

 

Talking about having a sense if humor or not, I am planning on taking with me a few nuts and bolts on my next 737 Max flight, and upon exiting the airplane..I will present a handfull of bolts and nuts to the captain at the exit door and claim I found them near the exit rows.....I wonder what his/her reaction would be....

 

Make sure you have your “get out of jail free” card handy……

 

Wouldnt that be fun?

 

N37408 is not a MAX, it is a 737-900 (NG series)

 

I believe -900s have the plug door (or actual door) as well. However, this isn't a design defect, it's a manufacturing process defect, so shouldn't be an issue that far back.

In fact, having read an account of what probably happened, I think any 737 that has been in service for a year or so and hasn't had an issue should be fine. This particular issue was a direct result of an error in the manufacturing process. Basically, they had to open the door to replace a seal (while it was on the production line), and while the seal replacement was entered into their tracking system, the door opening and closing was not. No one QA checked the door because that wasn't in the system.

 

May be an option on the -900. Interior arrangements shown in the Boeing Airport Planning Guide do not show the door on the -900, but do show the door on the -900ER.

Kurt said he was booked on a -9, but then shows a picture of a -900. That's all I was pointing out.

 

only 891 revisions off

bigger engines are a give-away for MAX status correct?

Insane.

 

lol

 

FAA now recommending airlines check the door plugs bolts on (non-MAX) 737-900ER models, apparently built between 2007-2019
https://www.faa.gov/media/74751

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Ohh...what a relief...thats only a 12 years period of time....they can't have possibly built more than a few dozen 737 900 right?

 

approx 505 737-900ER

 

See my post #152 above for my answer to that.

 

I think it all started with the invention of the "Shareholder Value". How can the shareholder (or stock market) be more important then the client or the employee who is the one who, with his skilled and dedicated work (for a good payment of course!), makes the client happy. The shareholder or the management that is only caring for the quarterly reports and the bonuses should be the last in line.
But if happy and motivated employees and workers produce an excellent product which makes the clients happy the management and the shareholders will eventually be happy too.

Just my 2 cents

Matthias

 

That (Boeing pushing for self-testing) and also private equity (Spirit Aerosystems spinoff from Boeing). I've had very positive experiences with private equity personally, but there are instances where it can be negative.

 

You know, it's funny, I'm a long-time (and recently, long-suffering!) Boeing shareholder... and I have to agree with what you are saying. And I believe that building great, solidly-engineered products would in fact generate more shareholder value than all the other stuff. That is certainly what this shareholder would like Boeing to do.

Start by moving the headquarters back to Seattle!

 

When you have atax code that makes executive payment above 1 million, not a deductible expense, compensation is invented by other means. So now we get to stock options etc. IF actual shareholders benefit from this thats just a secondary effect. Share buybacks, look at timing and retirement of executives.
Finance people and MBAs have a lot to offer, leadership and product integrity is not one of their traits.

Being was taken over by the finance types and all value was squeezed out of the company in the name of shareholder value (stock options). What's left is a mess and jumble of incompetence. Executives who should never be running a manufacturer let alone an aircraft manufacturer. imagine these guys building and running a nuke plant.

We can go all the way back to the 787, that miracle plane in which Boeing was going to get the subs to carry the cost, make the pieces which would just snap together. Im sure these are ideas that sound great in a Harvard MBA class. Or how about selling jet trainers at half the cost, because well you're going to make it up on support. What about the oprion capsule, stealth fighter, the list of failures is endless, they cant even get the 777X going. Then throw in hiring policies for engineers based on DEI.I could go on and on. The board and executive at Boeing cant fix the problem because they'd have to recognize the problem, and fundamentally they are the problem.

Nuke plants dont go boom not because utilities are not run by MBAs but because the DOE doesn't let them get out of bed in the morning without following very well proscribed procedure. Its just too risky to let the clowns do their own thing. Now in theory the FAA has oversight at Boeing, but short of a massively expanded staff and oversight of all minutiae you acnt expect the FAA to be there all the time, and in reality Boeign used to do tis own thing very well. Quality really was job 1. But hey you can make more $$$ firing the QC guys, cause they dotn produce and slow down the line.

yeah shareholder will demand change, but even if that change now happens the company is denuded and 500 odd peopel are dead, thats why shareholders now unhappy. Boeing is just a big GM these days.

So Boeing failed reinstall 1 door plug properly were told. Then how about the other planes with loose bolts, are those manufacturing defects but not this one.

How about Boeign failed to develop a new aircraft to compete with and surpass the a320, instead cobbled together the 737 derivatives, cause wow its way cheaper to do that and in the short term you might make more. <Meanwhile Airbus who was minimal 30 years ago is now 60% of the market.

This whole thing from beginning to end is management failure. We've had how many management teams over the past 30 years, it aint getting better.
Can you fix an airplane maker when there are no airplane guys left?

Two planes that literally fought their pilots and forced themselves into the ground, now this, whats next. I wouldn't travel on a Boeing if I could avoid it, and I wouldn't be happy being on one if I had to. Im a guy who grew up traveling on Boeing 7007 727 7337 and 747s

 

Harvard.

 

From this AM Bloomberg.

"Investors were long accustomed to playing a central role in Boeing’s strategic thinking. In the years leading up two crashes with 737 Max aircraft and the pandemic, Boeing handed back $68 billion to shareholders through share buybacks and dividends, far in excess of what archrival Airbus SE paid out."

 

The Black Suits in Chicago have managed to infect the engineering "culture" with their profit wizardry and cut -backs or other reduced cost magic like eliminating Quality Control because it was too expensive. I worked in Boeing engineering for a long time and i know what good people they are and what good engineering they produce. Then the MBA's get the product and start their trimming, manipulating, eliminating, hiding, short-cutting, and combining to save the company MILLIONS. They have no idea how an airplane is built (IS THAT WHAT THEY DO OUT THERE IN SEATTLE?) but we are going to cut the cost by getting rid of things that don't make the airplane or that cost too much. Curves, stock options, retirement funds, and status....now that ia what we'er here for. Now get rid of those older engineers and factory workers! Again, they cost too much and we can save millions by hiring high school kids and new hire engineers. They don't know anything but That's what you do !! Just like we did when we let Mulally and a bunch of other high paid executives go. After all , we had other people that we wanted in there. And then there was McNernney, he sure made a slash. So, sending the headquarters to Chicago where they don't build anything but skyscrapers and corruption was a wonderful move that disassembled the Boeing Company and removed most of the influence of heritage and coherence. Thanks, Phil.
I worked there for 45 years and I helped to start the jet transport industry and worked for and with the best. The company was led by people with a high sense of personal integrity and like they say. "Poop runs down hill." Direction from HONEST management filters through the entire company. You performed per drawing or work order every part of your job and failures and screw-ups were admitted, owned, and fixed. God help you if President Bill Allen caught you lying.
This whole thing makes me angry as hell to see what has happened to a great company when non-airplane and lax people take over and lose sight of the sole purpose of their being there.

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No, the HQ should not be in Seattle. Boeing is very spread out these days with only a minority in Seattle and having the HQ in Seattle drives the folks there to forget/ignore about the rest of the company. Having the executives near their biggest customer is a far better idea. In addition Boeing has long been strangled by the unions in Seattle (both SPEEA and IAM) there and needs to continue to move work to non-union locations.

 

^^^^^ I believe the general concensus to be that when one is at the bottom of a hole, one should stop digging. The current setup is obviously working sooooo well with the HQ in Chicago /////-: I would suggest that the separation and dispersal of the various units away from the Northwest has greatly contributed to the leaders of the company forgetting/ignoring the quality and engineering standards which made Boeing such a global force. The very attributes which now seem to be so conspicuously lacking.
Perhaps you could give an example of a current Boeing project which has benefitted from the current structure? I’m struggling to think of even one.