I fly enough to be concerned. After reading about it for months, I think this is what happened.
Sometime in the early 1960’s two engineering teams were assigned projects. One group was assigned a household toaster, the other developed a medium range commercial passenger jet. They set to work with slide-rules in hand, pocket protectors stuffed with pencils. A flurry of calculations involving triangles, temperatures, and Pi were started.
The groups reviewed a mountain of goals and variables, energy consumption, efficiency, customer satisfaction, throughput, time, safety, costs, and contribution margin. Both groups found success in the boardroom and the marketplace. Banks lined up to give away free toasters with new savings accounts, banks lined up to collateralize derivatives of secured debt notes to finance airplanes for state sponsored airlines. People enjoyed breakfast, families flew to Aruba, everyone won.
Time passed and things changed. Consumers demanded more toast, done to various brownness, wider toast, denser toasts. The engineers modified, adjusted, tweaked wider slots, new knobs, more power. The airplanes, needed to fly farther, faster, less expensively. The engineers modified, adjusted, tweaked, bigger engines, bigger wings, more computers. The demands kept coming: bagel capable, four-slice same-price, they wanted more passengers and less crew. The engineers modified, adjusted, tweaked the same as before until one day, the critical paths split.
Team toaster realized: We’ve beefed up, added to, cut waste and pushed the performance of this design to the maximum limits. If we push this any further, it may start a fire. We need to build a whole new enchilada.
Team airplane realized: We’ve beefed up, added to, cut waste and pushed the performance of this design to the maximum limits. If we push this any further it could stick into the ground like a lawn dart. Although they also wanted a new enchilada, they were told to push the designed further, integrate technology, use technology to overcome and compensate for limitations. The thinking must have included thoughts like computer crash – airplane crash…. if there’s a problem….we’ll just reboot…..at thirty-thousand feet.
The toasters started from scratch at great expense and created that sweet, automatic chain belt drive toaster you find in high production environments like the included breakfast buffet of mid-level hotel.
The 737 Max people cut cost beyond the point of diminishing returns, now they are toast.