Between 1953 and 1954
three British built de Havilland Comet airliners broke up in the air due to a fatal
design flaw. All passengers died and the production of the British jet was
halted. This kind of multiple aircraft construction failures has not happened since
then due to vast improvements in technology and safety. It is therefore virtually impossible that two
brand new planes like the Ethiopian and Lion Air 737 Max 8 would crash in similar circumstances within
five months from each other.
It should only take days
to see exactly what happened on board – the two black box recorders of the Ethiopian plane will not lie.
But in the meanwhile, there are other steps that should be urgently taken,
including to universally ground this aircraft type.
Of course, not all
in-flight control problems lead to crashes. For example, the Lion Air plane
involved in the crash in Indonesia in October 2018 experienced severe flight
control problems during its previous flight, but the pilots managed to land
safely. If it was not for the fact that the same plane crashed on its next leg,
we would never have known of the difficulties that the first flight experienced.
It is therefore crucial to check the log books of all 737 Max 8s and check
how many of these have experienced problems with their flight-control systems (MCAS)
during the past two years since they came into service. If this kind of flight control difficulties
have cropped up with greater than normal frequency, there is clearly a huge
problem.
The FAA issued a damning
safety warning concerning erroneous inputs to the flight control system of
the Max 8 and their conclusion is self-evident and devastating for Boeing,
airline companies and frightening for passengers: “there is a potential for
repeated nose-down trim commands of the horizontal stabilizer (which) could
lead to excessive nose-down altitude, significant altitude loss, and possible
impact with terrain”.
This brings us to the question: why are any 737 Max 8 aircraft still flying?
