cedric

The difference in seat width in Y is about a third of a cm as configured by AC, certainly not an inch.
As per AC's website, seat width on the 320 series is 45.3 cm compared to 45.0 cm on the MAX.
One thing that would impact comfort is the smaller recline - but that could also have been implemented on a densified 320 series (and in fact has been on the rouge aircraft).

Believe the aisles are narrower on the 737, though.

Stranger

That the AC pilots union has raised the issue should be telling us something. Likewise apparently American has allowed crews (at least cabin, I don't know about pilots) to decline working on 7M8s. with no penalty

KenHamer

I think the episode I was referring to is actually called "Who's Flying the Plane?":
(I think I have it on my DVR. I'll check when I get home.)

Stranger

That video is largely content-free. And anyway, these cases are more or less orthogonal to the current situation where a virtually free computer-based "solution" to a major safety issue was adopted in place of a needed costly redesign of an airframe component. Which may not have been anticipated early on when looking at the project economics.

And no, I don't hold my breath that there is going to be anyone with enough clout to force Boeing to do the right thing. They'll fix the band aid. Which may make things better to some extent. Or ultimately not. Wishful thinking is a powerful emotion. Especially when big bucks are at stake.

KenHamer

Claiming that the fault was 100% anything is always a mistake. Invariably there are a whole series of missteps that all contribute to the end result.

Apparently there was a procedure to deal with the MCAS problem on the Lion Air flight that was not followed. By the logic above it would seem that incident was also 100% pilot error either because the pilot didn't do what he was supposed to or he was not properly trained.

I'm not in any position to make a claim either way on either incident. But it seems there have been a long series of incidents from minor to decidedly not minor caused by disconnects between the pilot and the plane's technology. One that comes immediately to mind is a plane that experienced a small bump due to minor turbulence at the exact moment the pilot requested an "auto-land". Because the plane perceived it was ascending when the auto-land was requested the software determined this was an emergency descent request and doubled the rate of descent.

It's also not just computers that can cause problems. Also on the B737, but a much earlier generation, was some weird hydraulic valve that caused 2 crashes and almost a 3rd before being resolved.

Finally, I'll again express my surprise at how archaic aircraft technology implementations are compared to ships. There have been lots of incidents where some change of state was indicated by nothing more than a small symbol on a display screen, that went unnoticed. This has happened in planes (autopilot inadvertently disconnected when someone gently moved the control yoke) and in air traffic control systems where the controller did not notice an "X" that changed to a "Z" which resulted in a plane being directed to the same altitude as as plane on the same route in the opposite direction.

Nothing of consequence changes on a ship's bridge without an audible alarm, and that alarm persists until acknowledged.

However both ships and aircraft seem to suffer one common problem -- alerts whose meaning are not easily understood. For example a Helios flight that indicated the plane was not configured properly for flight (or maybe take off) but otherwise appeared to be flying perfectly. The problem was the cabin was not being pressurized thus resulting in everyone on board succumbing to hypoxia and the plane crashing. If the system was smart enough to detect that the cabin was not being pressurized then it should been smart enough to say "The cabin is not being pressurized." Just saying "something is wrong" doesn't cut it.

KenHamer

The most basic of science: you can't prove a negative.

In other words, there's no way you can prove that an aircraft will never fail. The fact that virtually every commercial airline model every made has suffered a major incident clearly shows that you can't prove something completely safe in all conditions. You can't prove anything will never fail.

KenHamer

Peripherally related:

What Kills Us? How We Understand Risk.

Jumper Jack

Now we have Aeromexico, GOL and Singapore
Seems irresponsible to not ground the max fleet (perception wise at least).. or atleast give people the ability to switch from max to another route

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-12/aeromexico-becomes-latest-to-ground-the-737-max-boeing-update

Jagboi

Assuming it isn't mandated, any bets AC will be among the last (if at all) to voluntarily ground it's fleet?

Jumper Jack

Seems unlikely they will voluntarily ground the fleet given how bad their OTP already is

5mm

Stranger

This is getting very confusing. Are you both talking about the same crash? You seem to refer to the Mulhouse one. Pevious article by Ken mentions the MCAS. No MCAS in Mulhouse...

Stranger

At the time of the Lionair crash, Boeing had not seen fit to mention anything about MCAS to anyone. Presumably because they were not partucularly proud of it... So no, there was no procedure.

5mm

CZAMFlyer

I'll join the camp that says they most certainly won't ground their fleet unless TC mandates it. And TC won't unless the FAA does so first. Tin hat aficionados might explore the relationship between the FAA and the Boeing Corporation.

I don't necessarily disagree with AC's decision at this early stage to keep the plane flying; there is simply no sure reason to tether them to the ground. Hopefully the investigators make some early determinations.