WEBVTT - The Trials and Tribulations of the 737 MAX 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:07.240 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production of I Heart Radios 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:13.960 How Stuff Works. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. 0:00:13.960 --> 0:00:16.520 I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with 0:00:16.560 --> 0:00:19.880 I Heart Radio and I love all things tech. But again, 0:00:20.200 --> 0:00:22.040 this is another one of those episodes where I have 0:00:22.120 --> 0:00:25.160 to couch that so not that long ago, I did 0:00:25.160 --> 0:00:28.640 a series of episodes about the company Bowing and its history, 0:00:28.840 --> 0:00:31.600 which once again is in the news as I record 0:00:31.840 --> 0:00:35.280 this episode. So the week I'm recording this, which is 0:00:35.320 --> 0:00:38.720 the very end of October, actually technically today is November one. 0:00:39.320 --> 0:00:42.839 The CEO of Boeing just appeared before Congress to answer 0:00:42.960 --> 0:00:47.160 questions about the tragedies involving two seven thirty seven Max 0:00:47.320 --> 0:00:52.560 aircraft crashes. Politicians asked some very pointed questions to find 0:00:52.560 --> 0:00:55.560 out when people at Boeing became aware of problems with 0:00:55.600 --> 0:00:58.520 the aircraft and how much they knew, as well as 0:00:58.560 --> 0:01:01.360 other details. So in this episode, I want to explore 0:01:01.480 --> 0:01:05.560 exactly what went wrong and why. And while you could 0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:09.959 summarize the story by saying a sensor and some software malfunctioned, 0:01:10.240 --> 0:01:13.920 that's not really a full understanding of exactly what went 0:01:14.000 --> 0:01:17.959 wrong and why it went wrong. So let's start with 0:01:18.240 --> 0:01:21.440 the seven thirty seven Max in general, and the seven 0:01:21.520 --> 0:01:24.560 thirty seven Max is history really only dates back to 0:01:24.680 --> 0:01:28.600 July two thousand eleven. That's when Boeing learned that it's competitor, 0:01:28.760 --> 0:01:31.760 air Bus, had made a deal with American Airlines to 0:01:31.800 --> 0:01:36.520 sell two hundred A three twenty neo aircraft and the 0:01:36.560 --> 0:01:40.840 eight three twenty family of aircraft first debuted in nineteen 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:45.080 eight six. They're intended to serve as short to medium 0:01:45.160 --> 0:01:48.960 range aircraft. They are narrow body aircraft, which means they 0:01:49.160 --> 0:01:51.760 have a cabin that measures no more than thirteen ft 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:54.880 or four meters wide, and they have a single aisle 0:01:54.920 --> 0:01:56.760 going down the length of the cabin with seats on 0:01:56.840 --> 0:02:00.640 either side. In other words, these aircraft sir the same 0:02:00.640 --> 0:02:04.400 function as something like the seven thirty seven does. So 0:02:04.440 --> 0:02:06.240 it might be a good idea to do a quick 0:02:06.360 --> 0:02:09.320 rundown on the different sizes of aircraft and what they're 0:02:09.360 --> 0:02:12.880 intended functions are, and to understand why we even have 0:02:13.400 --> 0:02:16.440 these different sizes of aircraft. It helps to understand the 0:02:16.560 --> 0:02:19.760 history of the development of airports and airlines in general. 0:02:20.400 --> 0:02:22.480 I find that it could be easy to forget that 0:02:22.560 --> 0:02:26.080 the systems we have in place today evolved over time 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:28.880 out of necessity. But I also know that's not the 0:02:28.880 --> 0:02:31.520 focus of our episodes, So we're gonna be super general. 0:02:31.560 --> 0:02:34.040 I'm not going to spend an enormous amount of time 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:37.720 on this, So the Right Brothers, really, I'm not going 0:02:37.800 --> 0:02:39.639 to spend a whole lot time on this. But they 0:02:39.680 --> 0:02:41.880 developed the first real airplane in the United States in 0:02:41.880 --> 0:02:45.880 the early twentieth century by n In the United States, 0:02:46.040 --> 0:02:49.600 the government had passed the Air Mail Act that gave 0:02:49.600 --> 0:02:52.880 the Postmaster General the authority to work with private airlines 0:02:52.960 --> 0:02:56.960 flying between certain routes the ability to carry mail. This 0:02:57.000 --> 0:02:59.959 was sort of laying the groundwork for the modern airline. 0:03:00.440 --> 0:03:03.400 The government followed that up with the Air Commerce Act, 0:03:03.560 --> 0:03:06.280 which gave powers to the Secretary of Commerce to create 0:03:06.360 --> 0:03:09.880 the rules and regulations that would apply to commercial aircraft. 0:03:10.320 --> 0:03:15.080 That included requirements to license pilots, to certify specific aircraft 0:03:15.120 --> 0:03:19.320 as being safe for commercial operation, to establish air routes, 0:03:19.400 --> 0:03:22.880 and to create rules for air traffic. Now, many airlines 0:03:22.960 --> 0:03:25.960 in this time were regional. They were operating between a 0:03:26.040 --> 0:03:30.240 handful of cities within a general area of the United States, 0:03:30.280 --> 0:03:33.160 but they gradually were able to grow to provide service 0:03:33.240 --> 0:03:37.360 to more airports further afield. This might require a certain 0:03:37.440 --> 0:03:41.040 number of hops between cities, and it created an incentive 0:03:41.160 --> 0:03:45.040 for aircraft and engine manufacturers to find ways to increase 0:03:45.120 --> 0:03:48.040 the flying range of aircraft to allow for more direct 0:03:48.160 --> 0:03:53.560 service options between distant cities. The US government wasn't done yet, though. 0:03:53.760 --> 0:03:58.600 In ninety eight, Congress past the Civil Aeronautics Act, which 0:03:58.640 --> 0:04:02.600 in turn created these Civil Aeronautics Board or c a B. 0:04:03.280 --> 0:04:07.520 One of the board's responsibilities was to regulate airfare prices 0:04:07.640 --> 0:04:11.720 for passengers. Another was that it could assign specific routes 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:15.440 to airlines, giving permission for them to operate flights between 0:04:15.520 --> 0:04:20.359 specific cities. The price regulation meant that airlines couldn't really 0:04:20.400 --> 0:04:24.159 compete against each other with battling with lower fares for 0:04:24.279 --> 0:04:27.920 routes between the same cities. A ticket on one airline 0:04:27.960 --> 0:04:30.760 for a trip between let's say New York and Chicago 0:04:31.279 --> 0:04:33.680 would cost pretty much the same as a ticket on 0:04:33.720 --> 0:04:36.680 another airline because of this regulation. So that meant that 0:04:36.760 --> 0:04:41.600 these airlines had to differentiate themselves in service because price 0:04:41.800 --> 0:04:44.440 was going to be the same no matter where you 0:04:44.520 --> 0:04:47.920 were going. Right if you went on one air airline 0:04:48.040 --> 0:04:50.440 versus another you're gonna be paying the same amount, So 0:04:50.520 --> 0:04:52.640 why would you choose one over the other? Had to 0:04:52.640 --> 0:04:56.640 be because of the service. Further, if the Board determined 0:04:56.680 --> 0:05:01.320 then airline was providing sub standard service along a specific route, 0:05:01.800 --> 0:05:04.960 then the board would allow other airlines to operate along 0:05:04.960 --> 0:05:08.000 that same route in order to create the competition needed 0:05:08.080 --> 0:05:11.640 to improve service. So if the Board were to look 0:05:11.640 --> 0:05:15.280 at say t W A and say, your service between 0:05:15.279 --> 0:05:19.440 this city and that city has been reported as being substandard, 0:05:19.640 --> 0:05:22.359 We're now going to allow these three other airlines to 0:05:22.400 --> 0:05:25.839 compete in that space, the idea was that things would improve. 0:05:26.440 --> 0:05:29.359 In nineteen fifty eight, the US government established what we 0:05:29.480 --> 0:05:32.800 now call the Federal Aviation Agency or f a A, 0:05:33.240 --> 0:05:38.520 which oversees airline safety operations. Twenty years later, in nineteen 0:05:38.600 --> 0:05:42.599 seventy eight, the economic climate had changed in the United States. 0:05:42.960 --> 0:05:46.760 Foreign airlines offering service to the US were not bound 0:05:46.920 --> 0:05:50.760 by the price regulations of the Civil Aeronautics Board. American 0:05:50.800 --> 0:05:55.000 airline companies could not compete with the lower airfares posted 0:05:55.040 --> 0:05:58.120 by these foreign companies, and there was a growing resistance 0:05:58.160 --> 0:06:02.320 to regulations in general in the US, so Congress passed 0:06:02.360 --> 0:06:07.640 a deregulation Act than the Civil Aeronautics Board disbanded, The 0:06:07.720 --> 0:06:10.440 price regulations came to an end, and airlines in the 0:06:10.520 --> 0:06:13.039 United States could charge whatever they felt the market could 0:06:13.120 --> 0:06:16.560 bear for any of their airfares. This also allowed new 0:06:16.600 --> 0:06:19.839 airlines to join the market, which had previously been dominated 0:06:19.839 --> 0:06:24.280 by just a few major carriers. The influx of competition 0:06:24.880 --> 0:06:27.960 was a boon to passengers as far as airfare price 0:06:28.040 --> 0:06:30.840 is concerned, but less so when it came to in 0:06:30.960 --> 0:06:33.839 flight experience. More on that in just a moment. But 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:36.719 it also meant that some of the larger airline carriers 0:06:37.040 --> 0:06:41.039 were struggling to compete. They had grown very large, and 0:06:41.040 --> 0:06:44.040 they depended on a certain amount of revenue that happened 0:06:44.040 --> 0:06:47.160 to have been guaranteed by the regulated prices. So when 0:06:47.160 --> 0:06:51.120 those regulations went away and smaller, more nimble companies began 0:06:51.200 --> 0:06:55.599 operating routes previously commanded by these giant companies, while the 0:06:55.640 --> 0:06:59.360 giants began to wobble a little bit. This was exacerbated 0:06:59.360 --> 0:07:02.360 by an economic recession in the nineteen nineties that saw 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:05.080 a reduction in air travel, and some of the big 0:07:05.120 --> 0:07:09.440 airlines outright collapsed into bankruptcy, like t w A and 0:07:09.480 --> 0:07:13.720 Pan American. So another recession in two thousand one, and 0:07:13.760 --> 0:07:17.600 then the terrorist attacks on nine eleven further hurt the 0:07:17.640 --> 0:07:22.440 airline industry, which would remain unprofitable for five more years. 0:07:23.000 --> 0:07:26.360 Now since then, you know, since two thousand six, airlines 0:07:26.400 --> 0:07:29.880 have managed to turn things around for the most part. Now, 0:07:29.920 --> 0:07:33.320 the reason all of that was important is that it 0:07:33.360 --> 0:07:37.080 creates the foundation for us to understand why there are 0:07:37.120 --> 0:07:40.120 so many different types of aircraft out there, and why 0:07:40.240 --> 0:07:43.680 conditions and aircraft have changed over time, and this in 0:07:43.760 --> 0:07:48.720 turn informs us as to why Boeing made specific decisions. 0:07:49.240 --> 0:07:51.760 So you may have seen images of air travel in 0:07:51.760 --> 0:07:54.760 the nineteen fifties or nineteen sixties when it looked like 0:07:54.800 --> 0:07:58.080 everyone was dressed in their Sunday best and they're enjoying 0:07:58.120 --> 0:08:00.920 a big, comfy seat with plan D of leg room, 0:08:01.000 --> 0:08:03.720 and they might even be chowing down on an impressive 0:08:03.720 --> 0:08:07.120 looking meal. It's a pretty dramatic contrast to what you 0:08:07.160 --> 0:08:11.000 find on a typical commercial jet today. So let's talk 0:08:11.040 --> 0:08:13.840 about the different types of aircraft classes and what there 0:08:13.840 --> 0:08:17.880 for and why things have changed. So you've got wide 0:08:18.040 --> 0:08:20.560 body aircraft. These are the ones that are meant for 0:08:20.840 --> 0:08:25.640 long range routes, usually such as transatlantic or trans Pacific routes. 0:08:25.960 --> 0:08:29.960 They typically have two aisles running the length of the cabin, 0:08:30.400 --> 0:08:32.800 and the width of the cabin tends to range from 0:08:32.880 --> 0:08:36.600 sixteen to twenty feet or five to six meters. You 0:08:36.640 --> 0:08:39.920 can have up to ten or maybe even eleven seats 0:08:40.040 --> 0:08:44.280 arranged in a single row. In the economy class. They 0:08:44.320 --> 0:08:47.559 really pack them in like sardines and some aircraft. That 0:08:47.640 --> 0:08:50.040 means that with the size of some of these aircraft, 0:08:50.120 --> 0:08:52.960 you can have configurations that can carry more than eight 0:08:53.080 --> 0:08:57.400 hundred passengers, which is mind blowing to me. Most of 0:08:57.440 --> 0:09:01.800 them are more like two fifty four passengers, but there 0:09:01.800 --> 0:09:05.440 are some configurations that have significantly more than that. The 0:09:05.480 --> 0:09:10.360 original wide body aircraft were something like luxury vehicles. They 0:09:10.360 --> 0:09:14.120 were intended to provide a superior experience with more room 0:09:14.160 --> 0:09:17.240 per passenger than you would find on other types of aircraft, 0:09:17.320 --> 0:09:20.000 so they weren't all about packing as many people in 0:09:20.120 --> 0:09:25.000 as possible. But then once the industry underwent deregulation, folks 0:09:25.000 --> 0:09:27.160 that airlines began to figure out that there was another 0:09:27.200 --> 0:09:31.720 tactic they could use. They could cram way more seats 0:09:31.800 --> 0:09:36.280 on those aircraft, actually reducing the space for the average 0:09:36.320 --> 0:09:40.079 traveler and maximizing the number of passengers that could fit 0:09:40.160 --> 0:09:42.640 on a single flight. After all, the airlines were no 0:09:42.679 --> 0:09:47.240 longer restricted to a regulated airfare price. They didn't have 0:09:47.440 --> 0:09:50.840 to compete on the basis of service. They could compete 0:09:50.880 --> 0:09:53.760 by offering lower airfares, and they can make up the 0:09:53.800 --> 0:09:57.920 difference by putting more people on a single plane, so 0:09:58.080 --> 0:10:00.920 they could actually make more money per trip even by 0:10:00.960 --> 0:10:04.360 offering lower airfares per customer. By doing the old stand by, 0:10:04.559 --> 0:10:07.640 you make it up in volume, and after balancing out 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:11.200 the pros and cons of delivering a superior experience to 0:10:11.760 --> 0:10:16.280 the alternative of just going for the cold hard cash, 0:10:16.480 --> 0:10:19.680 most airlines went the cold hard cash route, and thus 0:10:19.720 --> 0:10:22.920 we started down the pathway of encountering aircraft with decreasing 0:10:22.920 --> 0:10:27.160 amounts of leg room, narrower seats, and other features that 0:10:27.240 --> 0:10:34.040 fuel stand up comedian routines. These huge aircraft are really expensive. 0:10:34.480 --> 0:10:37.520 They also can't fit on all runways, and not every 0:10:37.559 --> 0:10:41.240 airport can accommodate them. They were used for routes where 0:10:41.240 --> 0:10:44.760 it made the most economic sense to use them, typically 0:10:44.800 --> 0:10:49.440 on those transcontinental or trans oceanic flights. These tend to 0:10:49.480 --> 0:10:54.040 be long range aircraft because they are more expensive to purchase, maintain, 0:10:54.080 --> 0:10:58.040 and operate. Airlines typically have fewer of them in their fleets, 0:10:58.160 --> 0:11:02.000 so they dedicate them to these long range routes. Enter 0:11:02.080 --> 0:11:05.839 the narrow body aircraft. These became popular starting in the 0:11:05.960 --> 0:11:11.720 nineteen sixties, but they really took off pun intended after deregulation. 0:11:12.080 --> 0:11:15.840 They tend to be much less expensive to purchase, maintain, 0:11:15.960 --> 0:11:19.440 and operate than their larger cousins. They can fit in 0:11:19.480 --> 0:11:22.920 more airports and more runways, and they played into an 0:11:22.920 --> 0:11:26.760 economic strategy that airlines used to compete against each other 0:11:27.120 --> 0:11:29.680 because there was one other thing you could do to 0:11:29.920 --> 0:11:34.120 use to your advantage besides the level of service or 0:11:34.520 --> 0:11:38.160 the price of the airfare, and that was the frequency 0:11:38.320 --> 0:11:42.200 of flights for specific routes. Now this really got going 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:46.319 with deregulation and the emergence of new airlines. Now passengers 0:11:46.360 --> 0:11:48.840 could have a lot more options. When they were booking 0:11:48.840 --> 0:11:52.000 a trip earlier, you might have a route that only 0:11:52.040 --> 0:11:56.280 had two or maybe three flights per day between two cities, 0:11:56.679 --> 0:12:00.040 so the passenger had to fit their schedule with the 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:04.080 airline schedule. But with more routes approved and more narrow 0:12:04.120 --> 0:12:08.120 body aircraft in fleets, airlines had the chance to increase 0:12:08.160 --> 0:12:12.760 the frequency between certain cities that had demand that warranted it, 0:12:13.360 --> 0:12:16.080 and as you would imagine, most of the time, this 0:12:16.120 --> 0:12:19.120 would involve cities that had regular traffic between them. You 0:12:19.160 --> 0:12:23.240 weren't suddenly going to see an enormous increase in flights 0:12:23.280 --> 0:12:25.240 to some city that was far out of the way 0:12:25.240 --> 0:12:28.319 of everything else. Because there's no demand between two cities, 0:12:28.360 --> 0:12:31.280 it makes no sense to operate hourly flights between them. 0:12:31.480 --> 0:12:35.120 But for some routes that's exactly what did make sense. 0:12:35.440 --> 0:12:38.360 So airlines began to compete by telling customers, hey, we 0:12:38.440 --> 0:12:41.840 operate enough flights to your destination that you don't have 0:12:41.920 --> 0:12:44.680 to worry about conforming to our schedule. We've got a 0:12:44.720 --> 0:12:49.280 flight that fits your schedule. So this was the era 0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:52.680 in which we saw the narrow body mid range aircraft 0:12:52.720 --> 0:12:56.600 come into prominence, and that included the Boeing seven thirty seven. 0:12:56.920 --> 0:13:00.240 The original seven thirty seven was introduced by Bowing in 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:05.760 nineteen sixty six. It was nicknamed a square airplane because 0:13:05.800 --> 0:13:08.640 the length of the aircraft was the same as the 0:13:08.760 --> 0:13:13.120 width of its wingspan. Both were approximately ninety three feet 0:13:13.280 --> 0:13:15.960 or a little more than twenty eight meters. It's a 0:13:16.040 --> 0:13:19.839 twin jet engine aircraft and the original seven thirty seven 0:13:19.880 --> 0:13:23.920 had an engine mounted under each wing. This becomes an 0:13:23.960 --> 0:13:26.760 important element when we get to the design of the 0:13:26.840 --> 0:13:30.600 seven thirty seven Max. Now there are different versions of 0:13:30.640 --> 0:13:34.720 the seven thirty seven that have different dimensions. The original 0:13:34.760 --> 0:13:38.400 seven thirty seven one hundred innered service for the airline 0:13:38.480 --> 0:13:43.800 luft Hanza, among others. United Airlines expressed interest in purchasing 0:13:43.840 --> 0:13:47.640 some seven thirty seven's, but that airline wanted a slightly 0:13:47.679 --> 0:13:51.280 longer version of the aircraft, so Boeing adjusted it and 0:13:51.320 --> 0:13:53.840 then created a version of the seven thirty seven called 0:13:53.920 --> 0:13:57.640 the seven thirty seven two hundred, and There are several others, 0:13:58.040 --> 0:14:02.560 including the recent seven thirties even Max Okay so aircraft, 0:14:02.720 --> 0:14:05.240 like the seven thirty seven from Boeing and the A 0:14:05.440 --> 0:14:09.320 three twenty from air Bus, served similar purposes to act 0:14:09.360 --> 0:14:12.320 as a short or mid range aircraft capable of carrying 0:14:12.320 --> 0:14:16.800 around two passengers, which varies depending upon the aircraft's configuration. 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:20.040 By two thousand six, Boeing had been relying upon the 0:14:20.040 --> 0:14:23.520 seven thirty seven design for forty years, when the company 0:14:23.560 --> 0:14:26.840 began to consider the possibility of an entirely new design 0:14:27.120 --> 0:14:30.640 to fill essentially the same function as the old, reliable 0:14:30.720 --> 0:14:34.000 seven thirty seven. That decision was a huge one and 0:14:34.000 --> 0:14:37.320 would require a lot of steps, So Bowing kicked the 0:14:37.360 --> 0:14:40.200 idea down the road a few times, and then we 0:14:40.280 --> 0:14:44.200 get to two thousand eleven and American Airlines ordering the 0:14:44.320 --> 0:14:47.880 two hundred Airbus aircraft. It sent a signal to Boeing 0:14:48.240 --> 0:14:50.960 that delays we're going to cost the company big time. 0:14:51.280 --> 0:14:55.000 Now explain more in just a moment, But first, you know, guys, 0:14:55.840 --> 0:14:59.840 I've talked a lot about privacy and security on this 0:15:00.200 --> 0:15:03.040 show in the past, and I have to admit that 0:15:03.080 --> 0:15:04.840 there have been times that I haven't really taken it 0:15:04.920 --> 0:15:08.000 that seriously as seriously as I should anyway. But we 0:15:08.080 --> 0:15:10.680 all know that there are pitfalls out there, and it 0:15:10.720 --> 0:15:13.640 doesn't make sense to just hope you avoid them by luck. 0:15:14.040 --> 0:15:17.080 And heck, there's all that tracking that's going on by 0:15:17.120 --> 0:15:21.000 everything from online stores to social media sites. Your data 0:15:21.160 --> 0:15:25.120 is becoming their commodity. It's for these reasons that I 0:15:25.160 --> 0:15:29.920 recommend using Express VPN. Express VPN has easy to use 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:33.080 apps that runs seamlessly in the background of my computer, 0:15:33.360 --> 0:15:37.320 phone and tablet. Turning on Express VbN protection only takes 0:15:37.400 --> 0:15:41.520 one click. 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Protect your online 0:16:16.120 --> 0:16:18.920 activity today and find out how you can get three 0:16:18.960 --> 0:16:23.080 months free at express vpn dot com slash tech stuff. 0:16:23.480 --> 0:16:28.400 That's e x p R e S S vpn dot 0:16:28.440 --> 0:16:32.280 com slash tech stuff for three months free with a 0:16:32.280 --> 0:16:36.120 one year package. Visit express vpn dot com slash tech 0:16:36.160 --> 0:16:39.800 stuff to learn more. Now let's get back to the 0:16:39.840 --> 0:16:43.320 seven thirty seven Max Alright. I left off saying that 0:16:43.400 --> 0:16:46.840 Boeing concluded that developing an all new type of aircraft 0:16:46.960 --> 0:16:51.480 wasn't going to pun intended fly. As Airbus began to 0:16:51.520 --> 0:16:55.600 gain popularity among airlines and American airlines had as part 0:16:55.600 --> 0:16:59.600 of its plan and order for a re engined seven 0:16:59.640 --> 0:17:03.520 thirty seven aircraft. Boeing would need to focus on that effort, 0:17:03.680 --> 0:17:06.720 and it abandoned the design of an entirely new aircraft. 0:17:06.800 --> 0:17:09.880 It finally said, Okay, it doesn't make sense for us 0:17:09.920 --> 0:17:13.200 to create a new aircraft from the ground up. Let's 0:17:13.240 --> 0:17:16.000 go back to the seven thirty seven and make some adjustments. 0:17:16.520 --> 0:17:19.439 This also brought with it a few other potential benefits. 0:17:19.680 --> 0:17:24.240 Developing a new aircraft is time consuming and incredibly expensive. 0:17:24.640 --> 0:17:28.639 Not only is the development process itself expensive, then there's 0:17:28.680 --> 0:17:32.480 the certification phase, in which the aircraft must pass requirements 0:17:32.560 --> 0:17:35.919 set by the various aviation authorities around the world in 0:17:36.000 --> 0:17:38.760 order to be allowed to operate as a commercial aircraft. 0:17:39.000 --> 0:17:42.080 And then there's the training phase. Pilots have to train 0:17:42.160 --> 0:17:44.320 on the new aircraft to learn its systems and how 0:17:44.359 --> 0:17:47.560 it flies. Not all aircraft behave the same up in 0:17:47.600 --> 0:17:50.080 the air, and that means it's a really big deal 0:17:50.200 --> 0:17:53.720 to invest in an all new type of aircraft. It's 0:17:53.800 --> 0:17:57.760 asking for a lot of resources, both from the manufacturing 0:17:57.760 --> 0:18:01.800 company and the various airlines out there. Updating and existing 0:18:01.840 --> 0:18:05.520 design is far less daunting. The basic bones for the 0:18:05.560 --> 0:18:08.640 aircraft are already there, and if the changes are within 0:18:08.680 --> 0:18:12.920 certain parameters, you can get through regulations pretty easily. After all, 0:18:12.920 --> 0:18:15.800 the base aircraft has already been through that process and 0:18:15.840 --> 0:18:20.400 had been approved. Likewise, if the changes aren't dramatic, pilots 0:18:20.480 --> 0:18:23.639 might be able to fly those planes without any real 0:18:23.680 --> 0:18:27.440 additional training or having to go into any flight simulators, 0:18:27.480 --> 0:18:30.199 because the aircraft, at least in theory, is going to 0:18:30.240 --> 0:18:33.800 perform within the basic parameters of its predecessors. So there 0:18:33.800 --> 0:18:36.720 are a lot of strong business cases for sticking with 0:18:36.760 --> 0:18:40.680 a previously engineered design. Boeing's decision to stick with the 0:18:40.720 --> 0:18:44.480 seven thirty seven was both more economical and, due to 0:18:44.520 --> 0:18:48.760 the agreement it had reached with American Airlines, pretty much necessary. 0:18:49.280 --> 0:18:52.400 One of the big goals Boeing had was to improve 0:18:52.520 --> 0:18:55.440 fuel efficiency so that the seven thirty seven Max could 0:18:55.480 --> 0:18:58.800 fly the same distance as older seven thirty seven's while 0:18:58.800 --> 0:19:01.760 burning less fuel. That would also mean the seven thirty 0:19:01.800 --> 0:19:05.159 seven Max could potentially have an increased range of flight 0:19:05.760 --> 0:19:09.280 compared to earlier seven thirty seven's, and you could argue 0:19:09.359 --> 0:19:12.840 that ultimately it was this push that would lead to 0:19:12.880 --> 0:19:16.160 the tragedies of the two seven thirty seven Max crashes 0:19:16.600 --> 0:19:19.920 that would ground the global fleet of seven thirty seven 0:19:19.920 --> 0:19:23.720 Max aircraft. It's a sort of cascade effect where one decision, 0:19:24.320 --> 0:19:28.040 that being to re engine the seven seven would lead 0:19:28.080 --> 0:19:31.840 to other decisions that ultimately set the stage for catastrophe. 0:19:32.200 --> 0:19:34.080 And by the way, this is all very easy for 0:19:34.119 --> 0:19:37.400 me to say in hindsight, I'm not trying to suggest 0:19:37.400 --> 0:19:40.600 that I would have spotted the potential for disaster before 0:19:40.640 --> 0:19:43.760 it happened. It's only because it happened that we're able 0:19:43.800 --> 0:19:45.520 to go back and analyze this and see where the 0:19:45.560 --> 0:19:48.760 mistakes were made. But at the time it was not 0:19:48.800 --> 0:19:52.840 necessarily that clear, at least not outside of Boeing. Boeing 0:19:52.960 --> 0:19:55.240 chose for this new version of the seven thirty seven 0:19:55.560 --> 0:19:59.560 some engines from a company called CFL. CFM is actually 0:19:59.600 --> 0:20:05.200 a joint venture between g E Aviation and Saffron Aircraft Engines. 0:20:05.520 --> 0:20:08.520 So in two thousand eight, CFM introduced a class of 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:12.879 engines they called the Leading Edge Aviation Propulsion Class or 0:20:13.160 --> 0:20:17.399 LEAP l E a P. Boeing opted for the Leap 0:20:17.640 --> 0:20:21.160 one B model of engines, which has a thrust range 0:20:21.200 --> 0:20:25.239 between twenty three thousand and twenty eight thousand pounds of 0:20:25.280 --> 0:20:29.439 thrust or between one hundred and one killing Newton's of 0:20:29.480 --> 0:20:32.080 thrust and Newton is the amount of force required to 0:20:32.080 --> 0:20:35.000 accelerate an object with a mass of one kilogram and 0:20:35.040 --> 0:20:39.840 an acceleration of one second per second. CFM chose several 0:20:39.920 --> 0:20:43.960 engineering advancements that contributed to better fuel efficiency and its 0:20:44.040 --> 0:20:48.280 leap engines compared to older aircraft engines. That includes carbon 0:20:48.400 --> 0:20:53.399 fiber composite components that are stronger than earlier materials at 0:20:53.440 --> 0:20:57.160 a fraction of the weight, so while the engines are 0:20:57.280 --> 0:21:01.520 big larger than previous seventh D seven engines, they don't 0:21:01.520 --> 0:21:05.400 necessarily weigh as much as those older engines do. CFM 0:21:05.520 --> 0:21:10.000 also used additive manufacturing, more commonly called three D printing 0:21:10.320 --> 0:21:14.840 to produce those components. The leap engines also pre mix 0:21:15.040 --> 0:21:19.000 fuel and air together before the mixture hits the nozzles 0:21:19.080 --> 0:21:22.800 that enter the fuel into the combustion chamber, So older 0:21:22.840 --> 0:21:27.440 engines would inject essentially amissed a fuel into the combustion 0:21:27.520 --> 0:21:30.280 chamber and the mixing of the fuel and the air 0:21:30.359 --> 0:21:33.600 happened inside the chamber itself. But according to CFM, that 0:21:33.680 --> 0:21:37.200 meant lower fuel efficiency and greater emissions, So they say 0:21:37.280 --> 0:21:40.879 that this new method cuts down on emissions and you 0:21:40.960 --> 0:21:44.000 burn more of the fuel. The engines would give Boeing 0:21:44.200 --> 0:21:47.960 the boost and efficiency needed to meet American airlines requirements. 0:21:48.520 --> 0:21:52.359 In August two thousand eleven, Bowing officially announced the development 0:21:52.520 --> 0:21:55.119 of this new version of the seven thirty seven, and 0:21:55.119 --> 0:21:58.600 the company began to market the aircraft to various airlines. 0:21:59.119 --> 0:22:02.359 By December two thousand eleven, Boeing found a customer in 0:22:02.400 --> 0:22:05.800 the form of Southwest Airlines, which put in an order 0:22:06.000 --> 0:22:09.600 for one fifty of the aircraft. Aircraft that were in 0:22:09.600 --> 0:22:12.919 the earliest stages of development, mind you. From two thousand 0:22:13.000 --> 0:22:16.480 eleven to two thousand fifteen, Boeing worked on the design 0:22:16.600 --> 0:22:20.160 and production of the seven thirty seven Max. And here's 0:22:20.200 --> 0:22:23.520 where we see some other decisions that would ultimately contribute 0:22:23.560 --> 0:22:26.879 to the problems we saw when it entered service. The 0:22:26.960 --> 0:22:30.560 new engines were larger than the previous seven thirty seven engines, 0:22:30.600 --> 0:22:34.119 as I mentioned earlier, and traditionally those earlier seven thirty 0:22:34.119 --> 0:22:37.800 seven engines would be mounted under the seven thirty seven's wings, 0:22:38.400 --> 0:22:40.560 but these new engines were too big to do that 0:22:40.840 --> 0:22:44.479 and still allow for adequate ground clearance between the bottom 0:22:44.520 --> 0:22:47.600 of the engine and the ground itself, So that meant 0:22:47.640 --> 0:22:50.200 the engineers had to figure out where to put these 0:22:50.200 --> 0:22:52.600 engines on the body of a seven thirty seven, and 0:22:52.680 --> 0:22:56.240 ultimately they decided to move the engines forward along the body, 0:22:56.400 --> 0:22:59.280 ahead of the wings, and their position in such a 0:22:59.320 --> 0:23:01.959 way so that the exhaust of the engines is directed 0:23:02.040 --> 0:23:04.960 underneath the wings, which makes sense. You wouldn't want it 0:23:05.000 --> 0:23:07.280 to go right up against the wings you melt your 0:23:07.280 --> 0:23:10.640 own wings off. And also the way that their position 0:23:10.680 --> 0:23:12.880 now means that the bottom of the engine has sufficient 0:23:12.920 --> 0:23:17.680 ground clearance. But moving the engines forward had another consequence. 0:23:17.880 --> 0:23:21.080 It changed how the aircraft moved in flight. Moving the 0:23:21.119 --> 0:23:24.320 engines forward meant that in flight, the seven thirty seven 0:23:24.359 --> 0:23:28.479 Max has a slight tendency to tilt its pitch upward, 0:23:28.520 --> 0:23:31.639 in other words, to tilt its nose up towards the 0:23:31.680 --> 0:23:34.840 sky in a climb. That can be a problem for 0:23:34.920 --> 0:23:37.760 lots of reasons, but a big one is on takeoff. 0:23:37.760 --> 0:23:41.639 I mean, obviously you're climbing in takeoff, and in that phase, 0:23:41.720 --> 0:23:44.919 pilot's guide a plane into a climb to reach cruising altitude. 0:23:45.080 --> 0:23:47.919 So you don't want a plane to overcompensate and tilt 0:23:48.119 --> 0:23:51.720 further back than the plan to climb for lots of reasons, 0:23:51.960 --> 0:23:54.199 but a big one is that it can cause the 0:23:54.240 --> 0:23:57.920 engines to stall out. So for a jet engine to work, 0:23:58.560 --> 0:24:01.600 you have to have air flow going through that jet 0:24:01.600 --> 0:24:05.720 engine in sufficient quantities, so it has to be moving 0:24:05.720 --> 0:24:09.879 there in a sufficient speed. Essentially, I covered this in 0:24:09.960 --> 0:24:12.640 recent episodes, so I'm just going to do a quick overview. 0:24:12.880 --> 0:24:16.520 In a jet engine, incoming air hits fan blades that 0:24:16.600 --> 0:24:21.080