Last month, two prominent flight control experts and whistleblowers — one ex-Boeing, one ex-FAA — delivered to the U.S. Senate committee overseeing aviation a technical proposal to upgrade Boeing’s 737 MAX cockpit to current design standards.
The system on the MAX for alerting pilots about malfunctions during flight is outdated — and without an upgrade Boeing may need congressional action to extend the jet’s exemption from the latest safety regulation and get the upcoming final version of the MAX into service.
The proposed fix was offered as an alternative that all models of the MAX could be retrofitted with.
“It’s a matter of the will to do it,” said Joe Jacobsen, former Federal Aviation Administration safety engineer and agency whistleblower. “The question is, what’s the price tag?”
That’s a high-stakes decision. Boeing has argued bringing the MAX into compliance with the current crew alerting standards would cost billions of dollars.
And at a precarious moment for the company as it emerges from the pandemic more dependent than ever on MAX sales, requiring an upgrade would delay the entry into service of the final member of the jet family, the MAX 10.
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During the original certification of the MAX, Boeing persuaded the FAA to exempt the plane from the crew alerting regulation, arguing that any safety benefit would not be “commensurate with the costs.”
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