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Research Essays

Ethics in Boeing:  Maria Romano Silva
Rise and Fall of Boeing 737 Max: Gursimar Rana

Suppose you were riding in a trolley without functioning brakes and you are headed toward a split fork in the tracks. On the tracks you are currently on, there are five people standing who may be killed if the trolley keeps running on the current path. However, there's a wall on the other track which would result in the killing of yourself and the trolley. Here, moral philosophy or ethics comes into play. Which way do you switch? Do you take the utilitarian approach and let a greater number of people live? Or do you sacrifice them for your own life? 

Many know this philosophical scenario (or some similar variation of it) as the Trolley Scenario. It was actually my very first encounter with the concept of ethics. My dad, during his ethics class when studying for his Masters in Business Administration, had proposed to me the question. I concluded that it was better to steer the trolley into the wall. Although I would die myself, I would die at least knowing that it was worthwhile because I saved more innocent lives; my sacrifice would not be in vain. 

However, Boeing did not take this approach. They stayed on their current track and killed those innocent lives, in attempts to spare their own. If you haven't picked up on it yet, I am talking about the Boeing 737 MAX jet crashes in October 2018 and March 2019, which occurred in Indonesiaand Ethiopia, respectively, claiming 350 innocent lives. 

Over the years, there have been many debates and discussions around the true responsibilities of businesses in our society and capitalist free market. Milton Friedman, an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, around the mid 1900’s famously says that “the basic mission of business is to produce goods and services at a profit, and in doing this, the business is making its maximum contribution to society, and in fact, being socially responsible.” However, times have changed, new principles have been implemented, and society has become more open to holding corporations accountable. In the 2004 and 2007 amendments to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines for Organizations, or the FSGO, were made, stating that every company’s board of directors assume the legal responsibility of creating an ethical culture that provides leadership, values, and compliance. And leadership itself plays a huge role in corporate culture and its ethical posture. “Leadership, the ability or authority to guide and direct others toward achievement of a goal, has a significant impact on ethical decision making because leaders have the power to motivate others and enforce the organization’s norms and policies as well as their own viewpoints.”  From this, we can traceback the lack of ethical posture to the leaders in this situation, including those in Boeing, the FAA, etc. 

These “leaders”, if they even deserved to be called that, were blinded by greed. To quickly recap, Boeing was in direct competition with the new Airbus model, which recently came out and started to attract some of Boeing’s loyal customers. In efforts to outperform them, Bowing created a new model with bigger engines, imbalancing the whole design, leading to the creation of the AOA sensors and an expedited process to be on the market. Thus, lack of transparency, limited training, and blame placed on the lower levels of production and operation. Desperation and refusal to do things the right way got the best of them. Classical theorists say 

that “If this is well done, profits are maximized more or less continuously and firms carry out their major responsibilities to society”. My dad also says that the lazy, greedy man works twice as hard. In this scenario, Boeing got greedy, neglected their ethical responsibilities, and ended up going down for it. Now they have to work twice as hard to build back not only their 737 MAX Jet, but the whole reputation of the company, which was at one point so highly acclaimed. 

In the end, “the lessons learned from this case are the need to strengthen the voice of engineers within large organizations , the need for greater involvement of professional engineering societies in ethics-related activities, and moral courage in engineering ethics education.”3 Boeing is the example not to follow, until they can come back and learn from their tremendous mistake. Ethics are not to be seen as the enemy or a burden for anyone. These set of principles come out of the innate respect we must have for each other. If everyone abides by them, then society would be a much better place. 

Breaking news “ Lion Air Flight 610 crashes into Jakarta Ocean. Reason still unknown”. Families eagerly awaited answers on what happened. Just a few months later, Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crashed straight into the ground, nose-first. This was a result of Boeing’s greed. The Maneuvering Characteristics Argument system, better known as the MCAS system, was hidden behind the complex systems within the functionality of a plane. This new, unused system was introduced to the new 737 MAX plane, but was it really “introduced” to the public? 

For a long time, Boeing 737 and Airbus A320 competed head to head with each other. Despite a few key differences, these two planes were extremely similar from every angle.  Therefore, when Airbus unveiled the new Airbus A320 Neo, Boeing was threatened. Many airlines were thinking of making a shift to the newer, more fuel-efficient plane. Fuel efficiency was a major influence in the airline's decision because fuel accounts for 12-15% of the cost airlines are required to pay.  In response to this, Boeing initially decided to make a completely new plane but later decided that innovating the 737 was the better option.  Thus, in  May of 2017, Boeing introduced the new 737 MAX. The sleek and beautiful design of the cabin, winglets, and wings heavily impacted aviation for Boeing. What people did not realize was that under all that beauty hid a ticking time bomb, the MCAS system. This system would later ground the 737 MAX planes all over the world. However, this system wasn’t the only problem Boeing struggled with.  Internal problems such as incorrect certification processes, and miscommunication played a major impact as well, unfortunately leading to the demise of over 400 people. 

For the 737 MAX to compete fairly against the A320 Neo, it had to include technological upgrades as well as an increase in fuel efficiency compared to the A320 Neo.  The new winglets on the 737 Max are considered one of the best designs on any plane. The split scimitar was designed to help increase flight time/distance as well as reduce vortex creations. The one major improvement was the new engines. The new engines on the 737 Max are 8 inches larger in diameter compared to the previous model. Engines are usually placed right under the wing to maximize force for lift, however, the increase in size wouldn’t allow that on the new plane. To accommodate the new engine, Boeing decided to raise and move the engine forward so there would be sufficient clearance from the ground to the new engines. While testing this structure, they realized that this design would cause a disturbance in the traditional flight patterns and the handling of the plane.  The engineers noticed that by positioning the engine forward affected the pitch of the plane. After experimenting with many technical/physical solutions, Boeing decided to use the MCAS system. The MCAS system would automatically adjust the plane’s horizontal stabilizer by pushing the nose down when the system would notice a high angle of attack. The system only relied on one sensor. Rationally speaking, a system that carries the lives of over 300 people should not simply rely on one sensor but at least a few. However, Boeing said that a high angle of attack and failure of MCAS is highly unlikely to happen on a flight and that everything should be fine. In fact, the original MCAS design was certified by the Federal Aviation Administration. Another key factor was that pilots did not require new certification. Instead, they would only need to train for 2.5 hours to be cleared to fly the new plane. This was a major benefit for Boeing and airliners. 

As testing started, Boeing engineers noticed more errors and decided to upgrade the MCAS system by allowing the system to push the nose down during low speed and high angle of attack plots. The original design could only push the nose down by 0.6 degrees but during the upgrades, it was increased to 2.5 degrees. The final version of the MCAS system relied on one angle of attack sensor and could push the nose of the plane down at a high angle. 

 

October 29, 2018, 13 minutes after takeoff, Lion Air crashed into Jakatara Sea. In the 13 minutes, Pilots faced over 22 MCAS activations and had to correct their altitude numerous times from nosedives. A few months later in March of 2019, Ethiopian flight 302 faced similar problems and crashed into the ground nose-first. Hours after the second crash, many administrations started to ground the Boeing 737 fleet. After 2 years of the initial grounding, the 737 Max is officially flying in some countries.  Recently, on December 2nd, 2021, the Boeing 737 Max was officially cleared to fly in China. Though it is cleared now, why was it cleared before despite the issues within the system? The 737 Max was a faulty plane; a plane that should have never been in circulation, and, most importantly, a plane that should not have been flying over 150+ passengers. Miscommunication within the company and “half-cooked” data given to the FAA prove that Boeing knew what they were doing.  However, all Boeing focused on was money. If the MCAS system was in the manual, pilots would have needed to train longer, and the time needed to certify the plane would increase, eventually leading to a loss of money. Boeing fixed a design problem with a computational system that only relied on one sensor. It took 2 crashes and over 400+ passed souls to make this information public. Boeing, a star-struck company, is slowly losing people’s trust in light of this new information. In conclusion, there is a need to enforce changes within Boeing to ensure a problem like this never occurs again, not just for Boeing but for any company that puts people’s lives at risk.

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