Question

discuss the issue of the MAX 737 crash affecting the company(Boeing). Why is the company concerned with this issue?

Answer 1

Lion Air Flight 610 took off at 6:20AM local time from Jakarta, Indonesia on Monday 29 October 2018. Its destination was Pangkal Pinang, Indonesia's largest city in the Bangka Belitung Islands. The plane crashed into the Java Sea twelve minutes after takeoff killing all 189 passengers and crew. About five months later, at 8:38AM local time, Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 took off from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on Sunday 10 March 2019. It was meant for Nairobi, Kenya. The plane crashed near the town of Bishoftu, Ethiopia, six minutes after takeoff, killing all 157 people aboard.

Boeing acknowledged that a year before the aircraft was involved in two fatal accidents, she knew about a problem with her 737 Max jets, but did not take any action. The company said it had made an alert feature optional rather than normal unintentionally, but maintained that it did not jeopardize flight safety. In March, all 737 Max aircraft were grounded after an Ethiopian Airlines flight crashed, killing 157 people. Five months earlier a Lion Air crash killed 189 people. At the time of the grounding, the worldwide fleet of 737 Max planes had totaled 387 aircraft.

All it would have informed the pilots was that there were very different readings provided by the two angle-of-attack sensors onboard the aircraft. This mattered, because a single sensor data was used by the MCAS system, which was involved in the crash. The cause for the crash may well have been a fault in that sensor. But the pilots were not even aware of the presence of MCAS. This was a device designed to improve aircraft handling and to function in the background. The pilots would at least have known about MCAS in the second crash-and the sensor details may have been of some benefit to them.

Nevertheless, this will add to the burden on Boeing-as it initially decided not to notify airlines, despite being aware of an problem with the 737 Max Boeing maintains there was no need for the AOA Disagree warning for safe flight. But critics will be wondering if the company was complacent-and whether there is something more that the company has decided not to pass on to its customers, impacting this type of aircraft or any other types.