After the fall of two defective Boeing aircraft, the Trump administration blames the foreign pilots

The US aviation system urgently needs to restore world confidence after two Boeing 737 Max crashes.

Instead, the top Trump administration aviation official, under the impulse of Republican lawmakers, informed the world on Wednesday that the problem was not that Boeing had put a plane crashing in the sky, or that the lax supervision of the Federal Aviation Administration allowed it to fly. The problem, they argued, comes from meager foreign pilots – particularly those from Ethiopian Airlines and Indonesian Lion Air, who died fighting to extract Max jet planes from the disaster.

"I'm trying to be respectful because they're dead," said Rep. Paul Mitchell (R-Mich.) About convicted crews. But, "are not we concerned not only by training pilots in other countries, but also by the reliability of their logbooks?"

FAA Acting Director Daniel Elwell shared this skepticism and said he wanted "absolutely" to want to "look closely at training standards globally."

Representative Garret Graves (R-La.) Said he is concerned about "maintenance programs, pilot experience requirements, airline pilot training programs involved".

And Rep. Sam Graves (MB), the first Republican on the House Transportation Committee and a pilot (as he has repeatedly mentioned), criticized the deceased: they "never reduced the gases back ", they" just went too fast ", they followed" no operating procedure I heard about ".

"You have to know how to fly the plane!" Said Graves, accusing "pilot error" and "numerous misidentifications" on the part of the crew.

Elwell acknowledged that the problem should have been "immediately recognizable" for the pilots, but there was "an apparent lack of recognition". He blamed the Indonesians for not disabling the system and said the Ethiopian crew "had not adhered to the emergency situation" [advisory] we put "and" never controlled their air speed. "

Elwell taught this basic knowledge "in the early stages". "You do not pull a checklist … it's remembered and you're tested all the time."

Sam Graves has joined the denunciation. "I do not like denigrating other countries and their pilot training, but that's what scares me: getting on a plane or an airline that does not fall under the jurisdiction of the United States," she said. he declared. "It does not bother me that we continue to destroy our system based on what happened in another country."

Yes. Nothing makes foreigners want to buy Boeing jets like a bit of jingoism.

The inexperience of the pilot may well have played a role in the collisions following the malfunction of the infamous MCAS stabilization system. But that does not negate the fact that mistakes made by both Boeing and the FAA put the defective plane in the air in the first place. The Wall Street Journal reported this week that senior FAA officials had not reviewed the major safety assessments of the MCAS system and that Boeing had not characterized the essential component stall prevention system as malfunctioning. to be catastrophic. MCAS was not even mentioned originally in the aircraft manual. In addition, Boeing had deactivated a safety feature designed to warn drivers of system-related sensor malfunctions – but it would not have informed the airlines. Boeing only informed the FAA 13 months after discovering that it had offered additional optional security functionality instead of the standard version.

Elwell minimized these factors. In his response to the newspaper, the FAA's internal review revealed a weakness in supervision: "Frankly, nothing in this article has led me to anything I know," he said. Elwell admitted that the 13-month delay was not ideal, but he explained to stakeholders: "Do not make that which is not an essential security element a crucial security element." Elwell also defended a policy allowing Boeing to manage much of his own safety regulations, and he said that putting the Max back into service was "not subordinate" at the end of accident investigations.

Elwell did not forgive strangers so much. He complained that the aircraft immobilization (the United States resisted the move) "was not a collaborative process" and ignored the data. He hoped that Max's return will be more collaborative. "I think it's important for the world to have a certain level of confidence" in the plane, he said.

Exactly. So maybe take responsibility?

In the end, the other witness, Robert Sumwalt, president of the National Transportation Safety Board, warned against attacks by foreign pilots. "Maybe there are different standards around the world," he said. But "If an aircraft manufacturer sells planes around the world, it is important that the pilots who operate them in these parts of the world know how to exploit them. . . . Just to say that American standards are good and that this could be a problem with other parts of the world, I do not think that's part of the answer. "

Blaming the victim is seldom.