737 max flight control system install#
737 max flight control system software#
737 max flight control system series#

Rather than redesign the plane, Boeing chose to install MCAS, which it adapted from another aircraft. But the new engines significantly changed the pitch angle and stability of the older 737. Boeing was responding to intense competition from Airbus and demand from airline customers for more fuel-efficient, single-aisle planes. The company wanted to put bigger, more fuel-efficient engines on an older aircraft, the 737NG (Next Generation).

We can start with Boeing's decision to deploy MCAS.

737 max flight control system series#

In a series of decisions, they put profits before safety, did not think through the consequences of their actions, or did not speak out loudly enough when they knew something was wrong. Nonetheless, executives, managers, and engineers at Boeing were not stumped by the complexity or unpredictability of a new technology. Were the 737 MAX crashes truly a failure of technology, an advanced aircraft-control system? Or was it a failure of management? Of course, at many levels, technology and management are inseparable. A technical system failure was the proximate cause of the disasters, which cost billions of dollars in losses to Boeing and the airlines, and, much more tragically, the lives of 346 passengers and crew.įounded in 1916, Boeing remains one of the world's most renowned engineering companies. The 737 MAX had been Boeing's fastest-selling plane in history before government authorities worldwide grounded the fleet of nearly 400 aircraft-but only after the second crash. 5 The report blamed the two crashes in October 2018 (Lion Air, in Indonesia) and January 2019 (Ethiopian Airlines, in Ethiopia) on the computerized flight-control system called Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS). House of Representatives released a 238-page report on the 737 MAX debacle, concluding an 18-month investigation. Federal Aviation Administration cleared the Boeing 737 MAX for flight, but the history of how Boeing got to this point remains disturbing. Only one computer was used in the past, because Boeing was able to prove statistically that its system was reliable, the person said.On November 18, 2020, the U.S.

737 max flight control system software#

In the new configuration, both of the plane’s flight control computers would be monitored by software instead of the current one, and pilots would get a warning if the computers disagreed on altitude, air speed, and the angle of the wings relative to the air flow, the person said. Pilots in testing either took too long to recover from the problem or could not do so, one of the people said. The simulations found an issue that could result in the plane’s nose pitching down. Use of the second redundant computer, reported Thursday by the Seattle Times, would resolve a problem discovered in theoretical problem simulations done by the Federal Aviation Administration after the crashes. The Max was grounded worldwide after crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia that killed a total of 346 people. When finished, the new software will give Boeing a complete package for regulators to evaluate as the company tries to get the Max flying again, according to the people. Boeing is working on new software for the 737 Max that will use a second flight control computer to make the system more reliable, solving a problem that surfaced in June with the grounded jet, two people briefed on the matter said Friday.