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The European Aviation Safety Agency, which conducts its own independent review of Boeing's 737 MAX in the air, is not satisfied with a key detail of Boeing's solution to the jet. She wants Boeing to do more to improve the integrity of sensors that failed in two fatal accidents in Indonesia and Ethiopia, killing 346 people.
And it's demanding that Boeing demonstrate in flight the stability of the MAX during extreme maneuvers, not only with Boeing's recently updated flight control system, but also with this deactivated system.
These were among the revelations presented Tuesday in the European Parliament by Patrick Ky, executive director of the European Union's Aviation Safety Agency (EASA). Ky has listed what appear to be more stringent EASA requirements than those of his US counterpart, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
Boeing publicly announced that he was hoping to get FAA approval for the MAX in October, allowing him to resume passenger service in the United States this year.
In general, foreign regulators follow the FAA initiative. But after MAX's crashes revealed deficiencies in the FAA certification process, it's not certain.
One of Ky's slides cites a letter from the EASA to the FAA on April 1, less than three weeks after the MAX grounding, which set out four conditions for MAX to be put back into service.
The first stipulated condition is as follows: "The design changes proposed by Boeing are approved by EASA (no delegation to the FAA)".
The second is that EASA is conducting a "larger and additional independent review" of the aircraft, beyond the specific design changes made to the flight control system that went wrong during the crash flights.
If the FAA moved forward and allowed the MAX to fly when EASA waited later, this would create an unprecedented divergence in global regulations that would severely complicate the schedules of many airlines flying international flights.
FAA approval would only apply to US airlines flying domestic flights. European airlines operating the MAX, such as Norwegian Air, require authorization from EASA.
And that will put Boeing in a very awkward position if the FAA says the MAX is safe to fly while others delay approval.
The two MAX accidents were triggered by defective sensors that measured the angle of attack of the aircraft, the angle between the oncoming airflow and the wing. This failure then activated a new flight control system – a software called the Maneuvering Feature Enhancement System (MCAS) – which on each occurrence flight repeatedly lowered the nose of the jet.
Although Boeing has updated MCAS to now take into account the MAX's two Angle of Attack sensors instead of one and it does not work if they disagree, Ky said that EASA found this insufficient.
One of his slides states that even though Boeing's proposal has improved the Angle of Attack system, there is still "no appropriate answer to Angle of Attack integrity issues."
And EASA wants rigorous flight tests to prove MAX's safety with or without MCAS.
Boeing engineers designed the original MCAS to ease the feeling of yoke in the pilot's hands during certain high-speed stall and stall maneuvers.
Before the MAX is allowed to fly again with its passengers, EASA and FAA will require flight tests of the newly updated software. In addition, Ky said, EASA will ask Boeing to demonstrate the stability of the aircraft in flight tests involving high-speed cornering and stall maneuvering with disabled MCAS.
This last requirement should somehow help to satisfy the public's anxiety about the MAX. On the Internet, many Boeing critics have expressed concern that the jet is "inherently unstable" with oversized engines and "dressing" software is not good enough to fix it. The obligation made to EASA to fly safely without MCAS should demonstrate the opposite.
On Wednesday, the FAA declined to say whether EASA's requirements were stricter or in line with its own.
"We will not comment on specific details about the ongoing discussions," the FAA said in a statement. "The FAA maintains a transparent and collaborative relationship with other civil aviation authorities as we continue our review of changes to the Boeing 737 MAX software … Each government will decide to hand over the Aircraft in service on the basis of a thorough assessment of security. "
An FAA security officer, who requested anonymity because he was speaking without the approval of an organization, said that the US regulator had followed the MAX approval process, looking for flaws in the system "with a fine comb, as he had never done before".
"People know it may be something that they should have caught the first time," he said. "They want to make sure it does not happen again."
Nevertheless, the manager was not aware of the FAA's ongoing concerns with the Angle of Attack sensor system. He added that the changes to Boeing's software and systems had been virtually approved by the FAA and that only the level of pilot training required remained undecided.
Although US pilots have expressed confidence that computer-based training is sufficient, foreign regulators may require full flight simulator training. The FAA official said EASA's civil aviation directorate and Indian aviation regulator had hitherto been reluctant to accept only computer-based training. .
Ky's presentation confirms that, for EASA, the amount of pilot training required before passengers on the MAX flight fly is still "work in progress".
Ky said EASA had communicated to Boeing and the FAA in July a list of important technical issues, including insufficiently monitored system failures; forces needed to move the manual trim wheel too high; and a risk of confusion on the part of the crew in some cases of failure, including a single failure to take off depending on the angle of attack.
A slide showing the "last status" of the process indicates that pilot training and the Angle of Attack system remain in play.
In a statement released Wednesday, Boeing declined to comment on discussions with regulators. "We continue to work with the FAA and global regulators to address their concerns to bring the MAX back into service safely," the company said in a statement.
Tuesday, Alexandre de Juniac – president of the International Air Transport Association, told Reuters, in Chicago, that "with the 737 MAX, we are a little worried … because we do not see the unanimity international regulators that should be the case. "
"We are seeing a detrimental divergence for the industry," de Juniac added, calling on regulators to make changes to the single certification process "collectively," according to Reuters.
Ky's parliamentary presentation on the same day, also briefly quoted by Reuters, highlighted this discrepancy.
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