Will you fly on a Boeing 737 Max 8?

Will you fly on a Boeing 737 Max 8?

  • Yes

    Votes: 51 32.5%
  • No

    Votes: 79 50.3%
  • Not Sure

    Votes: 27 17.2%

  • Total voters
    157
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Really?? I’m a captain for a major airline.

Full disclosure: I fly the Airbus, so I am NOT an expert on the Boeing.
I was shocked to hear the copilot in the Ethiopian Airlines crash had only 200 hours! Do you think that is accurate? I have a FAA commercial pilot license and that required a minimum 250 hours. I'm pretty sure no domestic mid- or major airline would even consider hiring a pilot unless they had an ATP license, which I believe requires a minimum of 1,500 hours. I know international airlines have different requirements, but 200 hours is scary low! From my limited experience, there's just no substitute for time in the cockpit.
 
I was shocked to hear the copilot in the Ethiopian Airlines crash had only 200 hours! Do you think that is accurate? I have a FAA commercial pilot license and that required a minimum 250 hours. I'm pretty sure no domestic mid- or major airline would even consider hiring a pilot unless they had an ATP license, which I believe requires a minimum of 1,500 hours. I know international airlines have different requirements, but 200 hours is scary low! From my limited experience, there's just no substitute for time in the cockpit.

My brother in law is a pilot and has some truly scary stories about his time at Comair Aviation Academy. Many of his fellow students were already employees of various asian airlines and had jobs waiting for them back home. The funniest/scariest is about his roommate who was supposed to be doing touch and gos at Orlando Executive Airport (10 miles from the main commercial airport) but ended up doing his touch and go at Orlando International. The air traffic controllers finally gave up and cleared him to do what ever he wanted on what ever runway he wanted. He kept repeating the instructions he was given back to them incorrectly and they had no idea what he was really doing. That guy still graduated and went on to his job back home.
 
A Boeing 767 nose dived a few weeks ago. Is that normal? No. That is never normal, but it *may or may not* be an airplane design issue.

Well 2 disasters are very suspicious. Protecting lives comes first; grounding these planes until they figure this out was the right thing to do.
 
My brother in law is a pilot and has some truly scary stories about his time at Comair Aviation Academy. Many of his fellow students were already employees of various asian airlines and had jobs waiting for them back home. The funniest/scariest is about his roommate who was supposed to be doing touch and gos at Orlando Executive Airport (10 miles from the main commercial airport) but ended up doing his touch and go at Orlando International. The air traffic controllers finally gave up and cleared him to do what ever he wanted on what ever runway he wanted. He kept repeating the instructions he was given back to them incorrectly and they had no idea what he was really doing. That guy still graduated and went on to his job back home.

Thanks, I've never feared flying, but after reading this... :eek: :faint:

:rotfl2:
 


I was shocked to hear the copilot in the Ethiopian Airlines crash had only 200 hours! Do you think that is accurate? I have a FAA commercial pilot license and that required a minimum 250 hours. I'm pretty sure no domestic mid- or major airline would even consider hiring a pilot unless they had an ATP license, which I believe requires a minimum of 1,500 hours. I know international airlines have different requirements, but 200 hours is scary low! From my limited experience, there's just no substitute for time in the cockpit.
Yeah... That really stood out to me when I read that as well. Who knows??
It may or may not have been a factor. As you know, we need to wait and see what the investigation says.
 
I was shocked to hear the copilot in the Ethiopian Airlines crash had only 200 hours! Do you think that is accurate? I have a FAA commercial pilot license and that required a minimum 250 hours. I'm pretty sure no domestic mid- or major airline would even consider hiring a pilot unless they had an ATP license, which I believe requires a minimum of 1,500 hours. I know international airlines have different requirements, but 200 hours is scary low! From my limited experience, there's just no substitute for time in the cockpit.

Ethiopian Airlines actually has a really good safety record, so I'm assuming (although have no real information, of course) that the 200 hours was for that specific plane or maybe for Ethiopaian Air, not flight time in general. Like you said, 200 hours would be shockingly low for a large commercial airplane.

ETA: I just did a quick google search, and you're right that many articles say he just had 200 hours of flight time, in general. In an emergency, you can definitely see how that would have effected the ability of both the pilot and copilot to respond.
 
Well 2 disasters are very suspicious. Protecting lives comes first; grounding these planes until they figure this out was the right thing to do.
I agree it’s the right thing to do now that there is at least some evidence the two accidents may be related.
 


My brother in law is a pilot and has some truly scary stories about his time at Comair Aviation Academy. Many of his fellow students were already employees of various asian airlines and had jobs waiting for them back home. The funniest/scariest is about his roommate who was supposed to be doing touch and gos at Orlando Executive Airport (10 miles from the main commercial airport) but ended up doing his touch and go at Orlando International. The air traffic controllers finally gave up and cleared him to do what ever he wanted on what ever runway he wanted. He kept repeating the instructions he was given back to them incorrectly and they had no idea what he was really doing. That guy still graduated and went on to his job back home.
Lol!!! I shouldn’t be laughing, but I am!!
 
There was something on the news last night that SW was not charging the increased fares on changed flights, but I didn't listen 100% so that should be verified.

From doctor of credit -

Southwest normally allows customers to make changes or cancel flights without any fees. Due to the current issues surrounding the 737 MAX8 and Southwest’s decision to not ground these flights Southwest is allowing all customers to make changes to 737 MAX8 flights and nothing will be changed, even if the flight your changing to is more expensive (usually you pay this difference). Reservations can be changed through March 27th, 2019.

https://www.doctorofcredit.com/sout...ee-including-cost-difference-between-flights/
Mandatory grounding now and Southwest is not charging for changes or cancelations. From Southwest below. I just had to change my outbound flight as it was unavailable any longer.

Flexible Accommodation Options Available Through Sunday, March 31


Currently, we are offering flexible accommodations through Sunday, March 31. Due to high call volumes and extended hold times, we strongly encourage Customers to cancel, rebook, and check flight status at southwest.com.

Customers who are holding reservations may rebook in the original class of service or travel standby (within 14 days of their original date of travel between the original city-pairs and in accordance with our accommodation procedures) without paying any additional charge.
 
I've only skimmed the thread, but I remember reading after the first of these crashes several months ago an investigator after the fact saying something to the effect of, "If they'd only turned off the button [which apparently shut off the problematic function] this wouldn't have happened". In other words, I believe he was calling into question the pilots' experience, which we all know can be critical. However, by reports, many pilots were said to be complaining about this problem, including the pilots that flew the plane I mentioned the day before.

I'm currently on vacation so I am somewhat relieved to know I won't be flying home on one, but I believe I may have flown on one previously. I am a nervous flyer so all this news will make my flight a little more worrisome anyway. :bitelip:
 
Really?? I’m a captain for a major airline.

Full disclosure: I fly the Airbus, so I am NOT an expert on the Boeing.


You must LOVE these kind of threads then! Also the ones about which airlines are "best" to fly.

I'm curious what your feelings are regarding the 3 top FAA positions being filled by "acting" individuals, and the top position being a former American Airlines executive and airline industry lobbyist? Is this standard operation, or something a little unusual? Does it give you any concern?
 
Mandatory grounding now and Southwest is not charging for changes or cancelations. From Southwest below. I just had to change my outbound flight as it was unavailable any longer.

Flexible Accommodation Options Available Through Sunday, March 31


Currently, we are offering flexible accommodations through Sunday, March 31. Due to high call volumes and extended hold times, we strongly encourage Customers to cancel, rebook, and check flight status at southwest.com.

Customers who are holding reservations may rebook in the original class of service or travel standby (within 14 days of their original date of travel between the original city-pairs and in accordance with our accommodation procedures) without paying any additional charge.

Since this just goes through the end of the month, do you think that they will be able to swap out planes for future flights that were supposed to be on one of the grounded planes ?
We have a flight that was supposed to be on a Max 8. All flights with the grounded planes now show "sold out" when you look at the Southwest website
 
I believe there are 67 737 MAX 8 in service between Southwest, United, and American. If each plane was scheduled to fly 4 legs a day with an average of 165 seats, that is 44,220 seats taken out of service every day.

There are going to be a lot of people who are not going to be able to be accommodated on alternative flights.
 
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I believe there are 67 737 MAX 8 in service between Southwest, United, and American. If each plane was scheduled to fly 4 legs a day with an average of 165 seats, that is 44,220 seats taken out of service.

There are going to be a lot of people who are not going to be able to be accommodated on alternative flights.

I heard an aviation expert mention pulling planes out of retirement to make up for the lost seats. Not sure how that works, exactly.
 
Since this just goes through the end of the month, do you think that they will be able to swap out planes for future flights that were supposed to be on one of the grounded planes ?
We have a flight that was supposed to be on a Max 8. All flights with the grounded planes now show "sold out" when you look at the Southwest website
I doubt there are aircraft available to "swap out." It's just not cost-effective to keep spares. They will probably do their best to manage the capacity of the available aircraft in service.

It is both good and bad that Southwest only flies 737s. The good news is they can easily swap aircraft without as much concern for qualified pilots and crew, gates, etc. The bad news is they don't have the flexibility to change overall capacity very easily, as can other airlines with a variety of different sized aircraft. Airline scheduling can get very complex, very fast. I did a grad school project on optimizing airline schedules, based on real-world Eastern buying Braniff's South American routes. I still remember how difficult--and interesting--that project was.
 
For any given person who was anxious about flying on a Max 8, there is probably another person who will be mad as heck if flights start getting cancelled.
 
For any given person who was anxious about flying on a Max 8, there is probably another person who will be mad as heck if flights start getting cancelled.

I'd bet the ratio is probably much higher (e.g. for every one anxious flier, there will be 10 angry passengers who get delays/cancellations/schedule changes).
 
I'd bet the ratio is probably much higher (e.g. for every one anxious flier, there will be 10 angry passengers who get delays/cancellations/schedule changes).
I think you’re probably right!

In the end, the grounding was the right thing to do, especially in light of tangible evidence. But these airlines may have felt that a grounding was actually a disservice to their customers.
 
Since this just goes through the end of the month, do you think that they will be able to swap out planes for future flights that were supposed to be on one of the grounded planes ?
We have a flight that was supposed to be on a Max 8. All flights with the grounded planes now show "sold out" when you look at the Southwest website
My thought on all the sold outs are them (web IT) just locking them out so they have less people to try and move around later until they really know what's going on. Maybe...
 
I heard an aviation expert mention pulling planes out of retirement to make up for the lost seats. Not sure how that works, exactly.
There are many boneyards.

https://www.airplaneboneyards.com/airplane-boneyards-list-and-map.htm

Planes get sent there for various reasons, short term storage, long term storage, eventual destruction, etc.

Depending on how long they have been there and why they were sent there it can take quite awhile to bring them back into service. It is relatively common for airlines to store planes not needed until the next busy travel season. Those planes are stored ready to be brought back into service.

Many are claiming that Southwest will bring back their 737-300 that were retired as the 737 MAX 8 were delivered. It is not as simple as sending someone to the desert to fly them back home. None of their pilots would be current on that type aircraft. They would have to retrain/re-certify a number of pilots. That is expensive and time consuming. The planes have been there for two years. They may have been retired just prior to a D maintenance check coming due that will now have to be done. Expensive and very time consuming.

If the anticipated grounding is just weeks, nothing will be done except to cancel a lot of flights.
 
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