Feds to indict ex-Boeing test pilot over 737 Max crashes: report

This is worrisome, if they indict the pilot, what's to stop them from going after any other individual involved? Any (or all) of the engineers, mechanics, managers? In the US I didn't think individuals were personally liable for things their company did.

 

If he intentionally misled the FAA...

This could also roll uphill.

 

Why not? It's already like this in healthcare. Just because someone is employed by a big hospital organization doesn't mean if something goes wrong they only go after the employer. The employees also get taken to court. Hence malpractice insurance.

 

Right, but test pilots (or engineers, mechanics..) don't have malpractice insurance. I've never heard of an individual being indicted for something like this before. If this goes through, its going to be harder to get folks to work on projects like this, or perhaps they'll start needing insurance as well.

 

Probably cut down on dissembling, which could be a good thing.

 

Yes, no insurance as strangely employees have not really ever been held accountable for negligence and doing something egregious as that has really only been done in healthcare. I think more accountability needs to be held rather than people thinking their butt is covered being an employee and it all falls on the employer...or trying to get around it and doing LLC thinking that is where lawsuits stops (not in healthcare).

 

I don't think this would actually improve anything. Everyone I know is basically already as accountable as possible, they already understand the gravity of what they do and how if they cut corners a plane could go down. I don't see adding another layer of consequence beyond killing a couple hundred people that you almost might potentialy go to jail as changing anyone's behavior for the better. What it would do is add a whole other layer of bureaucracy, lawyers and paperwork.

My understanding is that in countries like Italy this is the case, were the guy who signed the drawing is responsible and can (and has) gone to jail. However while this hasn't done much for aviation safety, it does vastly complicate the design cost.

 

Lots of pressure from the top not to extend the qualification timelines. Did not work out too well this time and they will now pay for it on every qualification.

 

A person in the production end of the 767 , quality control, refused to sign off a serious quality issue that needed fixing. It could have been a safety issue. He refused to pass it on because he had identified the cause and was told that it was too expensive to fix at the time and it would be handled later by another means. Because he refused to put his name on it he was agressively approached by higher levels but he still refused to sign it off with his name. It went higher and finally after a war up there, it was returned to the shop to be fixed. He put his job on the line and was pretty much ignored by supervision after that.

 

I should have said that he was somewhat ignored by supervision but his work was never questioned after that .

 

I suspect that the test pilot in question was a DER and listed as a Unit Member (UM) of Boeing's ODA. As such he may personally have liability insurance or same is provided by Boeing. Independent DERs carry such insurance because they are the ones signing their name for the approvals.

As for this specific case, I view it as someone is still looking to stick it to Boeing to score some political points. If someone wants to chase this legal case in court it should get pretty messy that is going to get a lot of dirt on a whole lot of people. Boeing's ODA administrator, every other UM that was involved in anything even tangentially related to the MCAS system, the variance in DER opinions, FAA incompetence at the Transport Directorate, Lion Air's inadequate pilot training, Lion Air's bad maintenance practices, Ethiopian Airlines crew lying into a flock of birds that took out the AOA and then loosing control of their airspeed.

I seriously doubt that whomever is building this potential prosecution has any actual understanding of what aircraft certification looks like down in the trenches.

 

If this is an indictment, it is criminal. No employer can save you from that, even if you commit a crime on the job, or at the direction of your boss.

Boeing may have civil liability (a separate matter) and the accused could cooperate and give evidence about someone senior to them for use in some future criminal prosecution.

 

Engineers, if they are "PEs," and stamped/sealed design drawings are certainly expected to be held liable - at the very least for any designs/calculations they put their seal on.

"Right, but test pilots (or engineers, mechanics..) don't have malpractice insurance." <---- Most licensed engineers I've know carry some form of "malpractice insurance," else they'd be drawn & quartered if any bridge the inspected (or heaven help them, designed) ever failed.

 

They are after an Arkansas engineer whose inspection passed the I-40 bridge over the Mississippi River even with a huge crack in a support beam. Bridge was down quite a while and they are looking for his head on a platter.

 

If the test pilot intentionally misled and withheld information from the FAA, that is a problem. If he just went along with the testing of a crummy design (with a single point of failure), that may not be criminal but not a very objective evaluation of a mode that takes control away from the pilot. He would know enough about flight control system design to figure out the potential risks and necessary training for the average and below average pilots. But, when Boeing is trying to make the aircraft fly like the earlier 737s, so no extra training is necessary, this is what you get. People compromising the principals.

 

When acting as a DER, or UM of an ODA, the sole criteria acting on behalf of the FAA is finding compliance with the FAR's. A DER/UM is not allowed to make interpretations of the regulations, including saying a regulation is outdated. The regs are what they are at a certain amendment level and the required cert basis is very specifically defined. Further a DER/UM has a defined set of regulations that they are permitted to find compliance with. They can not, and do not, make any finding of compliance on regs which are not on their ticket. If it comes down to 'he should have highlighted XXXXX' that is outside his area of responsibility as a DER/UM it will be a hard sell.

 

Sure, but PE's are something different and not something that exists in the US Aerospace industry. The only PEs I know at Boeing are ones who got their PE in some other field (generally Civil) before coming to Boeing. It's not something that's required for DER, nor do the DERs that I know have one.

 

https://www.flyingmag.com/former-boeing-tech-pilot-found-not-guilty-in-737-max-case/?utm_campaign=Newsletter%20-%20Flying%20Mag%20Daily&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=207863043&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_uwa6skmZBBgy2bk19-5dZry3ceZqRqyjIz-Om_Njc9u7ABO1BERXbD10s54upgOuH6ysLxOnpVYObPk13o_PelkakKA&utm_content=207863043&utm_source=hs_email

 

That's awesome, would have been a terrible precedent to set if they had found him guilty. Even charging him was awful.

 

Sometimes the good guys win. Having the Feds trying to steamroll you is scary.