Jivaro wrote on Feb 21, 2021, 15:54:
I already told my wife I will never get on a Boeing aircraft again and flying in any aircraft is not a thing I am doing anytime soon. Between the industry itself using a cost benefit analysis to decide whether to fix a problem or not on several occasions in my lifetime and stupid people in a pandemic being stupid....an airplane is the last place I want to be anytime soon. I realize this particular issue might have had more to do with the airline then Boeing, but that doesn't exactly make me feel better..lol.
Cost Benefit Analysis by industries occur in all walks of life, unfortunately. The same thing happens for recalls for automobiles, train parts, boat parts, you name it. They just recalled thousands of snow blowers last week(or just a few days ago?) because the automatic shut off for the blades could fail under certain circumstances. Nothing will ever be perfect, and fixing stuff or redesigning stuff unfortunately isn't free. All we can try to do is have a strong, non-corrupt government to regulate industry, and keep accidents/fatalities to a minimum, as much as humanly possible.
Even with these few high profile crashes and non-crashes, flying is statistically the safest form of travel by a gigantic margin. Even losing an entire engine, a 777 especially can fly almost a thousand miles, if needed (depending on fuel, etc.) . Airline regulations, not aircraft design limitations, make pilots turn around and go home when losing 1 engine on modern aircraft. Did Boeing do some underhanded shit that resulted in lives lost in the B737 MAX? Yes. Will the B737 MAX be far safer when it's returned to flight after this series of debacles? Yes.
In another post, you ask about a software fix to a hardware issue... I see what you're saying but that's not literally the case for the B737 MAX fix, they are adding 1 or more sensors (hardware) in addition to updating software, and depending on the airline, adding some additional fixes/protocols.
You would be flabbergasted to see how many flights occur, in the USA alone, with no incident every day. Even B737 MAXes that weren't grounded for various reasons are flying around now. That's partially why airline crashes or malfunctions make the news, it's literally so rare for such things to occur. Plus the massive increase in cellphone videos being immediately put online, of course.
All of that said, a lot of people will always have a fear of flying, because yes, if everything goes wrong, the aircraft can fall out of the damned sky. That being said, driving in most of the world is statistically much more dangerous to your health than flying. Nothing will ever be
completely safe as long as humans are involved though.
*EDIT* Besides, don't fly right now due to
COVID19(and the new strains), not fear of statistically improbable accidents.
*EDIT* Typos, grammar.
This comment was edited on Feb 22, 2021, 00:26.