Air India 787 Crashes in Western India

morleyz said:
Software doesn't think. It cannot reason. It cannot make decisions, despite the terminology being used in development. Software can take inputs and do something specifically programmed with those inputs then output something specifically programmed. There are always situations where the inputs are incorrect (faulty sensors, malformed inputs, etc.) or situations where the developers truly didn't anticipate something, both can lead to unexpected behavior. Rarely does a software error result in the software doing something expected, however the wrong expectation.

Your presumption that SGsOTI thought of exceptions that Boeing just didn't think of or intentionally allow these systems to catastrophically fail is simply ridiculous. I don't have a clue why you think this crazy chain of software failures, switches in the wrong position, sensors that no one tested at temperatures that are typical in may parts of the world, GPUs (what do GPUs have to do with a loss of thrust while departing?), blah, blah is likely. Yet, you can easily dismiss that humans, who can think and reason and make decisions might misinterpret valid inputs (I feel a loss of thrust, it must be this) and incorrectly output something (cutting fuel to restart engines, cutting the wrong engine in a single engine failure, manually deploying the RAT).
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For the record, I didn't say, nor do I think any of the crap you posted.
 
dtuuri said:
Not my understanding of the comparison, but I may be misremembering. I thought the ANA incident was a shutdown of both engines and it was due to being too light on the "squat switches" upon touchdown when the pilot deployed thrust reversers.
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Its my understanding in the ANA incident the reverse levers were lifted at the threshold and at wheel contact full reverse was selected then quickly dropped to idle. This out-of-sequence lever move and the subsequent reduction in reverse power before the aircraft was fully down on the runway caused a supposed TCMA activation which shut down the engines via the overspeed control system. However, as a side note, I believe the air/ground status system also uses a radar altimeter in addition to the weight on wheel sensor to confirm status.
 
Bell206 said:
Its my understanding in the ANA incident the reverse levers were lifted at the threshold and at wheel contact full reverse was selected then quickly dropped to idle. This out-of-sequence lever move and the subsequent reduction in reverse power before the aircraft was fully down on the runway caused a supposed TCMA activation which shut down the engines via the overspeed control system. However, as a side note, I believe the air/ground status system also uses a radar altimeter in addition to the weight on wheel sensor to confirm status.
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If the TR were lifted while airborne, doesn't FADEC/TCMA shut down the engine to avoid catastrophe? :dunno:
 
dtuuri said:
If the TR were lifted while airborne, doesn't FADEC/TCMA shut down the engine to avoid catastrophe?
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The way it was explained to me, a number of modern aircraft permit the TR levers to brought to the idle detente provided the throttles are at the idle stops. Once the air/ground system indicates the aircraft is on the ground an interlock or something is removed and allows the full reverse.

I do know on some legacy aircraft TRs were used in flight as speed brakes.
 
dtuuri said:
For the record, I didn't say, nor do I think any of the crap you posted.
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Except the multiple times you refer to the FADEC thinking, implying that your brilliant smoking gun (the series of events leading up to a take off with the ground test switch enabled) is something no one has ever thought of and you need a Boeing engineer to come here to tell you otherwise, and blaming the automations/software for other incidents that were in fact human error as evidence for your brilliant smoking gun.
 
flyingron said:
The Indian "NTSB" is called the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB). They have one of the oddest government websites I've seen.

Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau

AAIB, India is responsible for classification of ‘Safety Occurrences’ involving aircraft operating in the Indian Airspace into Accidents, Serious Incidents and Incidents.
aaib.gov.in
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Being odd is not evidence of being competent. I’m a prime example.
 
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morleyz said:
Except the multiple times you refer to the FADEC thinking, implying that your brilliant smoking gun (the series of events leading up to a take off with the ground test switch enabled) is something no one has ever thought of and you need a Boeing engineer to come here to tell you otherwise, and blaming the automations/software for other incidents that were in fact human error as evidence for your brilliant smoking gun.
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The crashed 737-Maxes "thought" they were at a higher angle of attack than actual, due to a sensor error. It's a figure of speech and does not imply sentience.
 
morleyz said:
Software doesn't think. It cannot reason. It cannot make decisions, despite the terminology being used in development.
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I know several humans personally, and some just from this particular thread, who could be described the same way.
dmspilot said:
The crashed 737-Maxes "thought" they were at a higher angle of attack than actual, due to a sensor error. It's a figure of speech and does not imply sentience.
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I know several humans who are supposed to be sentient, yet lack demonstrable examples of proof. Again, some have made themselves known in this thread.
 
EdFred said:
So it's basically a Facebook comments section.
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Maybe worse. At least in a Facebook comment section, someone who isn't a bot might be afraid they'll be called out on the BS they post. AI doesn't give two ****s. You can tell it its answer is wrong and it'll say "oh, sorry" and move on with zero remorse or regret.

This latest thing, with AI starting new discussions in groups, might be what finally gets me to leave and/or causes the world to end.

Rick A said:
Both engines failed simultaneously.
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Do we actually know that at this point?

Rick A said:
Air conditioning glitches were reported by prior passengers of that aircraft. The survivor said the lights flickered soon after liftoff. Don't know what other reasons could connect all three of those reports (if all true) together than a software issue within the flight management computer. Wild Ass Guess is just that...
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The FMS isn't connected to any of the other systems you mention.

Personally, I'm leaning towards an electrical fault caused by bad maintenance.
 
dmspilot said:
The crashed 737-Maxes "thought" they were at a higher angle of attack than actual, due to a sensor error. It's a figure of speech and does not imply sentience.
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It implies some lack of specificity or autonomy. If you told me that you "think" you're at a higher angle of attack, I would question if you actually knew what was going on. MCAS did exactly what it was programmed to do, it didn't think it was at a higher angle of attack. As far as the MCAS system was concerned, the airplane was at a higher angle of attack and it trimmed the airplane as it was programmed to do. An electo/mechanical issue in the AOA sensor had it sending incorrect data. Had the pilots been trained properly on how to recognize and deal with the runaway trim issue, there would have never been a crash.

My point is that the software and automation is not making decisions and acting autonomously. They process very strict algorithms. No one would have intentionally programmed any output that would shutdown both engines at 600 feet. Pilots have the autonomy to make decisions based on their inputs and it's entirely plausible that they could have shut down both engines. Just like ultimately it was the pilots that brought down the 737 Maxes, not the software and automation.
 
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morleyz said:
It implies some lack of specificity or autonomy. If you told me that you "think" you're at a higher angle of attack, I would question if you actually knew what was going on. MCAS did exactly what it was programmed to do, it didn't think it was at a higher angle of attack. As far as the MCAS system was concerned, the airplane was at a higher angle of attack and it trimmed the airplane as it was programmed to do. An electo/mechanical issue in the AOA sensor had it sending incorrect data.
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I thought I had seen peak quibbling on this site but now this really takes the cake.

Everyone and their mother anthropomorphizes objects or non-autonomous systems in this way without implying any form of autonomy, sentience, or non-determinism when speaking colloquially. The airplane “thinks” it is at a high AOA because a sensor is feeding it bad data, the electron “wants” to be at a lower energy state, the volatile compound “seeks” another molecule with which to react.

Is it the most technically precise way of speaking? No. Should it be used in formal technical writing or communication? Definitely not. Is it sometimes useful to communicate with other human beings? Yes.

Go to any technical discussion where someone is trying to explain something that isn’t being well understood and odds are you will hear some anthropomorphism.
 
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AKiss20 said:
I thought I had seen peak pedantry on this site but now this really takes the cake.

Everyone and their mother anthropomorphizes objects or non-autonomous systems in this way without implying any form of autonomy, sentience, or non-determinism when speaking colloquially. The airplane “thinks” it is at a high AOA because a sensor is feeding it bad data, the electron “wants” to be at a lower energy state, the volatile compound “seeks” to react with another molecule.

Is it the most technically precise way of speaking? No. Should it be used in formal technical writing or communication? Definitely not. Is it sometimes useful to communicate with other human beings? Yes.

Go to any technical discussion where someone is trying to explain something that isn’t being well understood and odds are you will hear some anthropomorphism.
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I don't disagree with this, but I do when you (not you, the general you) think that systems in airliners have autonomy to do things they weren't programmed or designed to do (or even worse that they were programmed to do something catastrophic) and that software or automation are likely what brought down the Air India flight.
 
morleyz said:
I don't disagree with this, but I do when you (not you, the general you) think that systems in airliners have autonomy to do things they weren't programmed or designed to do and that software or automation are what brought down the Air India flight.
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Maybe I missed it, I’ve only sped read some of the thread, but has *anyone* here actually argued that the software on the 787, has any form of autonomy, sentience, or non-determinism? That’s very different from unintended and unanticipated, but still deterministic, consequences of complex software systems.

The poster you quoted explicitly stated he did not and yet you carried on as if he had.
 
AKiss20 said:
Maybe I missed it, I’ve only sped read some of the thread, but has *anyone* here actually argued that the software on the 787, has any form of autonomy, sentience, or non-determinism? That’s very different from unintended and unanticipated, but still deterministic, consequences of complex software systems.
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More a general indictment of software and automation as the evidence for why software or automation "likely" brought down this flight and what I read as a pretty flimsy chain of systems failures triggering the FADECs deciding to shut down both engines. Further the attitude that if we didn't have modern automations and everything was back to the days of pulleys and cables, none of these accidents would have occurred.
 
morleyz said:
More a general indictment of software and automation as the evidence for why software or automation "likely" brought down this flight and what I read as a pretty flimsy chain of systems failures triggering the FADECs deciding to shut down both engines. Further the attitude that if we didn't have modern automations and everything was back to the days of pulleys and cables, none of these accidents would have occurred.
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Yeah that’s fine, but that’s not what you wrote. You quibbled about a poster anthropomorphizing and then, when he clarified, you continued to quibble.

I think this back and forth doesn’t need to continue, but I better understand your intended point (and actually fully agree with it!).
 
Bob Noel said:
A "software issue within the flight management computer" wouldn't cause AC glitches or cabin lights flickering.

The software in an aircraft is not some huge monolithic blob with everything connected to everything.
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But shorting systems control wires certainly could
 
Bell206 said:
I do know on some legacy aircraft TRs were used in flight as speed brakes.
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Yes, the DC8, which had no speed brakes--only roll-control and ground spoilers.

Did it a couple of times. Lots of noise and vibration. Could only reverse the inboards. It was something you tried to avoid needing to do.

The interlocks, which restrict movement past idle, generally release when the associated thrust reverser is fully deployed. They prevent application of thrust while the thrust reversers are in transit as that would produce forward thrust. There are also interlocks which prevent the reverser levers from being raised if the thrust lever is forward of the idle position, for the same reason.
 
Mikey52 said:
But shorting systems control wires certainly could
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That may be where the bungled maintenance is implicated. Betcha designers don’t always consider that.
 
Piperonca said:
That may be where the bungled maintenance is implicated. Betcha designers don’t always consider that.
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Actually, some do. Did a Pratt & Whitney plant tour twenty five years ago, to include the design bureau. One of the engineers said part of his personal design philosophy was to ask himself, "What happens when a journeyman mechanic who just barely made it through apprenticeship starts turning wrenches on this thing?"
 
Larry in TN said:
Yes, the DC8, which had no speed brakes--only roll-control and ground spoilers.
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I seem to recall there were several European models that had the ability as well. There are also a few videos out of a C17 performing a tactical decent using its thrust reversers.

Piperonca said:
That may be where the bungled maintenance is implicated. Betcha designers don’t always consider that.
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The 787 was supposedly the first design to use computer generated human factor design concepts were they would generate on screen mechanics to see if they could access the need areas to perform the required mx. I believe it also addressed methods to aid in reducing mx errors as well. Regardless, you can only do so much to protect both mechanics and pilots from themselves and rely on them performing their jobs as required.
 
Bell206 said:
The 787 was supposedly the first design to use computer generated human factor design concepts were they would generate on screen mechanics to see if they could access the need areas to perform the required mx. I believe it also addressed methods to aid in reducing mx errors as well. Regardless, you can only do so much to protect both mechanics and pilots from themselves and rely on them performing their jobs as required.
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The maintainer accessibility requirement has been around a long time for government contracts (see MIL STD 1472). Computerizing helps I'm sure, but I will always believe a manufacturer should use physical mock-ups for user review during preliminary design. Concur totally with your last statement.
 
catmandu said:
Actually, some do. Did a Pratt & Whitney plant tour twenty five years ago, to include the design bureau. One of the engineers said part of his personal design philosophy was to ask himself, "What happens when a journeyman mechanic who just barely made it through apprenticeship starts turning wrenches on this thing?"
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That probably was my good friend, the late Franks Gillette or one of his staff. Frank was intense in his design objectives to always consider the Mechanics. A prime example on the F119 engine the F-22. All of the LRU’s are on the bottom of the engine where they can be accessed with the engine installed.
 
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morleyz said:
Software doesn't think. It cannot reason. It cannot make decisions, despite the terminology being used in development. Software can take inputs and do something specifically programmed with those inputs then output something specifically programmed. There are always situations where the inputs are incorrect (faulty sensors, malformed inputs, etc.) or situations where the developers truly didn't anticipate something, both can lead to unexpected behavior. Rarely does a software error result in the software doing something expected, however the wrong expectation.

Your presumption that SGsOTI thought of exceptions that Boeing just didn't think of or intentionally allow these systems to catastrophically fail is simply ridiculous. I don't have a clue why you think this crazy chain of software failures, switches in the wrong position, sensors that no one tested at temperatures that are typical in may parts of the world, GPUs (what do GPUs have to do with a loss of thrust while departing?), blah, blah is likely. Yet, you can easily dismiss that humans, who can think and reason and make decisions might misinterpret valid inputs (I feel a loss of thrust, it must be this) and incorrectly output something (cutting fuel to restart engines, cutting the wrong engine in a single engine failure, manually deploying the RAT).
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TLDR. Needs Short Circuit reference.

1751389587773.png
 
Of interest- IF true, is the statement that the preliminary report is due out next week.
 
That cabin video from the flight before speaks more loudly now.
 
tobnpr said:
Of interest- IF true, is the statement that the preliminary report is due out next week.
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Preliminary from who? India? One of the 8 theories here is equally as trustworthy.
 
tobnpr said:
Of interest- IF true, is the statement that the preliminary report is due out next week.
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Why would it not be true? ICAO requires member nations to publish a prelim 30 days after a mishap. Don’t expect a smoking gun; our prelim’s rarely do.
 
Preliminary Report from the AAIB.

An Air India 787 made in the USA crashed shortly after takeoff with multiple fatalities. The Data Recorders have been recovered. They are being examined.
 
X3 Skier said:
Preliminary Report from the AAIB.

An Air India 787 made in the USA crashed shortly after takeoff with multiple fatalities. The Data Recorders have been recovered. They are being examined.
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…But it wasn’t our fault.
 
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