Boeing
Photo by SOCIAL.CUT
A few days ago, the door blew off of an Alaska Airlines Boeing Max 737 plane shortly after takeoff. If you have seen the news broadcasts you know that a young boy was saved by his seat belt. He did have his shirt torn completely off of his body. Thankfully no lives were lost but this is the second series of planes from Boeing that have been taken off the runways in the last few years. This Boeing plane the 737 Max 9 follows a lengthy hiatus of the Boeing 737 Max 8. The 737 Max 8 was grounded from March 2019 to December 2020 after 346 people died in two separate plane crashes. 387 planes were grounded worldwide. A multitude of problems came to light after subsequent investigations fined Boeing for design flaws. Lawmakers investigated Boeing’s incentives to minimize training for the new aircraft and the FAA revoked Boeing’s authority to issue airworthiness certificates for the Max planes. The FAA also fined the company for “undue pressure” on its designated aircraft inspectors.
When we look at all of this together it seems as if Boeing was getting much more powerful than most of us realized. It gets scary when a company gets to influence all of the oversite controlling it. Also, as we have seen in the past, it makes for the possibility of trouble down the line. There is a reason that third party checking works. It creates an unbiased system that keep people safer than without one. So, with that being said, I would hope that Boeing would put in an extra effort to make the 737 Max 9 the best plane it possibly could. Well, that did not happen. The only American carriers that bought the 737 Max 9 are Alaska and United airlines.
Investigators know the sequence of events that led up to the door blowout. But they have yet to find the missing “door plugs” that help hold the door in place. So, until then they do not even know if they were installed in the first place. If the bolts are not found then the door must be examined by a microscope to determine if they were ever there.
I do not claim to understand the engineering that goes into airplanes. I am sure that it is an achievement to get all of that metal to fly those many miles. It is truly amazing. And amid these 737 Max problems they are still delivering a record number of planes each year. Orders to delivery time is years. And I know that the actual construction of the fuselage is farmed out to a subcontractor. So, we do not know if there is any fault or where is might lie if it exists.
But it seems like we have a classic case of a company that has gotten too big and too powerful to adhere to the rules that govern the rest of us. The earlier list of design flaws and things such as pressuring aircraft inspectors and trying to minimize training time in the aircraft. Was this done only for more profit? Probably. And look where that has gotten Boeing. Some will call the 737 Max planes the safest planes in the world. Surely, they log as many miles as any other type of aircraft in the world. But 346 lives lost on the Max 8 will sing a different tune. And could others have been lost if other doors had blown off planes in midflight. Thankfully everyone had their seatbelts on. But United and maybe Alaska Airlines found more bolts in other parts of the plane loose. What else could have happened?
Maybe we all need to step back and evaluate what is really at stake here. Has corporate greed pushed us to only do what is necessary to get these planes built? Maybe when so many lives are at stake, we put some of the profits aside and make better planes? I might be wrong. For as many planes that fly everyday in the world there are so few accidents. But were we on the verge of more? And will it be worth it? What will the actuarial decide?
