WASHINGTON, May 6 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Boeing engineers identified a fault with a pilot warning system on its 737 MAX aircraft in 2017, a year before the deadly Lion Air crash in Indonesia, the company said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Boeing said that management was unaware of the issue until the crash in
Indonesia, which killed 189 people, and the planes were not grounded until
after another of the type operated by Ethiopian Airlines went down several
months later, leaving a further 157 people dead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
According to Boeing, a supposedly standard piece of equipment that tells
pilot about disagreements between angle of attack (AOA) indicators \u2014 which measure the plane\u2019s angle vis-a-vis oncoming air to warn of impending stalls \u2014 did not in fact activate unless an additional optional indicator was purchased by airlines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That left airlines that did not buy the optional indicator \u2014 including
both Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines \u2014 without the safety feature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Faulty angle of attack indicator information may have played a role in
both of the deadly crashes, causing the 737 MAX anti-stall system to
unnecessarily activate and push the nose down toward the ground even as
pilots fought to maintain altitude.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn 2017, within several months after beginning 737 MAX deliveries,
engineers at Boeing identified that the 737 MAX display system software did
not correctly meet the AOA Disagree alert requirements,\u201d the aircraft
manufacturer said in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe software delivered to Boeing linked the AOA Disagree alert to the AOA
indicator, which is an optional feature,\u201d it said. \u201cAccordingly, the software
activated the AOA Disagree alert only if an airline opted for the AOA
indicator.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A Boeing review \u201cdetermined that the absence of the AOA Disagree alert did
not adversely impact airplane safety or operation,\u201d concluding that \u201cthe
existing functionality was acceptable until the alert and the indicator could
be delinked in the next planned display system software update,\u201d Boeing said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSenior company leadership was not involved in the review and first became aware of this issue in the aftermath of the Lion Air accident.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Boeing\u2019s entire 737 MAX fleet has been grounded since shortly after the
Ethiopian Airlines crash in March, while investigators study the incidents
and engineers work on solutions. — NNN-AGENCIES
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
WASHINGTON, May 6 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Boeing engineers identified a fault with a pilot warning system on its 737 MAX aircraft in 2017, a year before the deadly Lion Air crash in Indonesia, the company said. Boeing said that management was unaware of the issue until the crash inIndonesia, which killed 189 people, and the planes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[208],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23531"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23531\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}