I drive 737s for a living and would happily fly the Max with my whole family on board. In fact, my training having included management of runaway trim incidents, I would not object to piloting the pre-fix Max. Those tragic incidents, with their inexcusable loss of lives, should never have been more than annoying inconveniences. Obviously, the MCAS system needed to be fixed as did the sweetheart relationship between FAA and Boeing. I strongly suspect that the software issues have long since been resolved and FAA is now doing damage control and reputation repair. That's OK, there's no such thing as "too safe." It will be interesting to see if FAA and EASA hold Airbus to the same strict standards.

(Written on 2020/07/03)(Permalink)

Your comment could stand as a monument to absolutely stupendous ignorance. I have been piloting 737s for over a decade and would happily fly the first 737-Max to come off the line. It is reliable, easy to fly, and safe. There were problems and they have been fixed, period.

(Written on 2020/03/27)(Permalink)

Spare us your ill-informed condescension. It doesn't matter if this was a US carrier, an African carrier, or the Vatican air force. It doesn't matter if the pilot was from the Netherlands, Swaziland, or the moon. This was incompetence, pure and simple. Like Steamjet, I have flown in the cockpit for thousands of hours, landing everywhere from state of the art airports to bush strips. It is not, repeat NOT difficult to distinguish runway lights from taxiway and boundary lights, even in category III conditions. Rationalizations about circadian rhythms and "unreliable infrastructure" are clever buzzwords for you to toss around but they do not excuse poor performance when hundreds of lives and millions of dollars are on the line. I'd suggest that you not talk the talk until you have walked the walk.

(Written on 2020/01/03)(Permalink)

Thank God it wasn't a Boeing. The Airbus fanbois would be having orgasms.

(Written on 2019/12/27)(Permalink)

Badly fractured my wrist after tripping on uneven sidewalk outside a federal office building. Still getting letters from PI firms FIVE YEARS LATER!

(Written on 2019/12/27)(Permalink)

We always said that the TTA acronym stood for "Try, Try Again."

(Written on 2019/12/13)(Permalink)

I vividly recall flying as a young child on Southern Airways DC-3s, including an occasion when there were 13 pax on board and seven threw up. None of them in the sick sacks. Quite a flight.

(Written on 2019/12/13)(Permalink)

Could have been worse. Could have said "excursion from the tarmac."

(Written on 2019/11/15)(Permalink)

At least the media didn't refer to "the tarmac."

(Written on 2019/11/01)(Permalink)

737 pilot here. No one gets a free pass on this one. The FAA has become slack and careless. Boeing made some serious errors and created the situation in which these disasters could occur. The performance of the pilots was shockingly inept. For all of Boeing's misdeeds and all the FAA's sloppy oversight, sharp, on the ball pilots could have completed these flights, written up the problems, and everyone could have gone on about their business. All the jeering and finger pointing accomplishes nothing. Everyone involved needs to get on the ball, fix the problems, and move on.

(Written on 2019/06/21)(Permalink)