The tragic deaths of scores of passengers in two separate accidents — one in Indonesia, and another in Ethiopia — both involved 737 Max aircraft. Aviation safety records have been unprecedented and high, compared to other transportation modes. Hence, it is shocking that these accidents appear to be connected to product failures (as against other causes such as human errors, system coordination faults, or acts of terrorism).
In my view, it was even more shocking to see FAA’s inaction (their decision opined “no basis to order grounding of the aircraft”), more than 48 hours after China and Europe stopped the flight of all 737 Max aircraft until the President stepped in to stop those flights. (Compare the FAA statement with Civil Aviation Administration of China, which pronounced “zero tolerance for safety hazards and strict control of safety risks”).
The best explanation that I have read on what’s happening with the 737 Max aircraft is at AirCurrent by Jon Ostrower. Anyone who titles an article as
The World Pulls the Anton Cord on the 737 Max
has my unending admiration.
Quality Begins at Home
As many readers of this blog know, Andon Cords are used in the Toyota Production System to stop work within the factory on the detection of errors. Andon cards keep the errors from getting out of the plant and prevent faulty finished goods from reaching customers’ hands. (Then, it is too late!) In my MBA core class, I sometimes teach the Toyota case. In the case, the seat assembly section at the Kentucky plant decides to not pull Andon cards and deviates from Toyota Production System (TPS) leading to an inventory buildup. (Similar inventory pileup that occurred when Tesla deviated from the Toyota Production System, and Musk went on record that they were over-automated).
Boeing has now seen the worst-case outcome of such product failure outside of the factory — lives were lost when using the product. (The investigations are not complete in both cases, but it is fair to say that regardless of the root cause of the accidents, Boeing’s days look tough).
The article by Jon Ostrower covers the issue with fantastic detail and clarity.
(a) Engineering issues with 737 Max. Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) that would automatically trim the horizontal stabilizer to bring the nose down, to balance other oddities.
(b) 737s were supposed to save Boeing from the heavily cost-riddled 787 production boondoggle. But, in fact, the costs associated with the Dreamliner delays directly fed into the short-termism of 737 redesign.
Read the entire article on AirCurrent. Highly recommended.
Notes:
1. 787 Backlogs are still high. https://www.boeing.com/investors/accounting-considerations.page/