Why the U.S. waited to ground the Boeing planes

On March 14, 2019 By admin

• Breaking News

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration has come under increasing pressure from lawmakers, pilots and aviation experts to explain why it delayed grounding Boeing’s 737 Max 8 aircraft after the jet was involved in a second crash in less than six months.

The FAA on Wednesday made the decision to ground the planes, only after dozens of other countries already had. The agency’s acting director, Daniel Elwell, said they didn’t have the kind of data that would warrant a grounding prior to that.

“We’re a data-driven organization,” Elwell told NPR in a Thursday interview. “If a link is not made, you don’t have a common thread; there is not a need for grounding. So once we got the data, that made that relatively clear.”

The data Elwell is referring to is the aircraft’s configuration just after takeoff as well as more granular, satellite-based tracking data.

Despite criticism about the delay at home, international experts say that the FAA was right to wait for hard evidence before grounding the flights, though they warned that the agency’s close links to the airline industry make it look like the delay was politically influenced.

Boeing, based in Everett, Washington, has close links to the Trump administration. Elwell himself used to work for Boeing’s trade association, acting defense secretary Patrik Shanahan was a longtime Boeing executive, and the company gave $1 million to Donald Trump’s inaugural fund.

“The FAA was in a difficult position because as the lead for the airworthiness of the Max, they would perceive a duty not to produce a catastrophic business decision without the evidence to do it,” Dai Whittingham, chief executive of the U.K. Flight Safety Committee, told VICE News.

The FAA is not only responsible for regulating airlines and making sure safety standards are maintained, some think it still has a mandate to promote the industry.

At a time when China is threatening to disrupt the almost complete dominance of the commercial aviation market by Boeing and Airbus, following a series of mergers and acquisitions in recent years, questions will be asked about where the FAA’s priorities lie.

The FAA says it has a responsibility for airline and passenger safety and nothing else and that it never took Boeing’s business into account when making the decision to delay grounding the jets.

“The FAA does not have that dual role,” Elwell told NPR, saying the agency’s promotion of the industry stopped 30 years ago. “The FAA makes safety decisions, period.”

“The FAA makes safety decisions, period.”

But many experts and former FAA officials said that this is not the case, claiming that the agency works to promote the U.S. aviation industry and this causes problems for how the agency acts.

“There is obviously a type of colliding objectives here: On the one side, they are responsible for the safety, on the other side for promoting the industry,” Jan Hagen, a professor at ESMT Berlin business school and author of a book on how the aviation industry deals with errors, told VICE News.

Panic response

Within hours of Ethiopian Airlines flight ET302 crashing on Sunday morning, killing all 157 people on board, Chinese regulators grounded all Boeing 737 Max 8 jets. Regulators in Europe, Asia, and Australia acted much quicker in order to safeguard their citizens.

But these actions appeared to be caused more by public “panic” than based on any available evidence.

“The public was jumping very quickly to the conclusion [that the planes were unsafe] and there was mounting pressure to do something, although we really don’t have any positive data right now,” Hagen said.

The Ethiopian investigators leading the probe into the crash announced Wednesday they were sending the black box to the Bureau d’Enquêtes et d’Analyses, France’s aviation regulator, where it will be decoded and hopefully provide more information about what caused the crash.

So far experts have focused on the 737 Max 8’s automated control system known as “maneuvering characteristics augmentation system” (MCAS), which was designed to counteract the tendency of the plane’s larger engines to tip the plane’s nose upward.

Pilots have complained about the lack of training they’ve received on the new jet, introduced two years ago. The 737 Max is Boeing’s replacement for the old 737, and when it was introduced, the company convinced the FAA that there was no need to have a different rating for this particular variance of the aircraft.

The reason Boeing pushed for this rating, Whittingham says, is so that airlines would not have to go through rigorous and expensive pilot retraining. Pilots are not required to go through simulator training on the new aircraft but have to do what is known as “differences training,” which amounts to a few hours of computer-based training.

Assessing airworthiness

Throughout the early part of this week, the FAA maintained that the 737 Max 8 was “airworthy” and it had seen no evidence to change that view. That all changed on Wednesday when they said they were grounding all flights after seeing ”new evidence collected at the site and analyzed today.”

The FAA said evidence points to “some similarities” between the Ethiopian and Indonesian disasters that “warrant further investigation of the possibility of a shared cause that needs to be better understood and addressed.”

Despite the mounting pressure, the FAA’s decision would not have been taken lightly, as “grounding” is a distinct airworthiness term, and doing so means the FAA will now have to provide proof it is airworthy again.

“Once you ground an aircraft because of a problem, you then have to find the evidence to unground it,” Whittingham said.

While the FAA maintains it made its decision purely on the evidence available, many others believe that political pressure or a desire to protect itself guided the decision to delay grounding the flight.

“My fear is that the FAA is simply trying to save face and avoid acknowledging the safety defect that they failed to find when they certified the plane’s safety,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said Tuesday.

The suggestion that the FAA had bowed to political pressure was fueled in part by the Boeing CEO’s call to Trump on Tuesday to reportedly lobby on behalf of his airline, while U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao and her entire staff flew on a 737 Max 8 to show their support for the beleaguered airline.

But regulators in other countries didn’t have to bow to political pressure, as they didn’t have any skin in the game.

“The similarities [between the crashes] were enough evidence to convince some regulators, particularly where there were no political implications for them,” Whittingham said.

Cover: Five Boeing 737 Max jets are grounded at Sky Harbor International Airport, Thursday, March 14, 2019 in Phoenix. The U.S. issued an immediate emergency order Wednesday, grounding all 737 Max 8 and Max 9 aircraft in the wake of the crash of an Ethiopian Airliner. (AP Photo/Matt York)

Nazi salutes, swastikas spark soul searching in OC…

On March 14, 2019 By admin

• Breaking News

‘Not just about a few kids’: Nazi salutes and swastikas spark soul searching in O.C.

Nearly a week after images from a Nazi-themed party attended by teenagers in Orange County sparked outrage, school officials and the community have been working to turn the incident into a learning experience.

Images from the party appearing on social media showed a group of students — arms outstretched in a Nazi salute — gathered around red plastic cups arranged in the shape of a swastika.

“German rage cage,” one partygoer captioned a photo, presumably referencing the popular drinking game Rage Cage before posting it on Snapchat.

“Ultimate rage,” another wrote.

Here is how the repercussions have played out this week:

► One parent, who did not want to be identified, said that on Sunday, he invited a Holocaust scholar to his home to speak with nine students who had attended the party. Some students who had defended the conduct did not accept the invitation to his home, but the students who did go expressed remorse and decided to write apology letters, the parent said. “My actions were disgusting, appalling, irresponsible,” one student wrote.

► The school district said this week that it has interviewed more than a dozen students about the party and the investigation was continuing. It said it would not disclose any disciplinary actions, citing student privacy laws.

► JSerra Catholic High School in San Juan Capistrano said Tuesday that a student at the school photographed at the party is “now a former student,” and a local soccer club said Wednesday that a player linked to the incident is no longer with the team.

► Karen Yelsey, a Newport-Mesa Unified School District board member, said the board intends to add an item to the agenda for its next meeting recommending that Supt. Fred Navarro create a task force to “determine the best course of action to help educate not only our students but also parents, teachers and the broader community as we work together to fight anti-Semitism and bigotry in all forms.”

Eva Schloss, the stepsister of Holocaust diarist Anne Frank, met Thursday with some of the students who attended the party.

She was surprised to learn that some students fdidn’t understand the pain they could cause with their actions.

“I was their age when I realized my life was completely shattered and I would never have a family again,” she said.

Schloss said the students apologized for their actions and said they didn’t mean any harm.

“I hope the school and students have got the message and things will be different,” she said.

Community members filled the Corona del Mar High School theater Thursday night to discuss the situation.

The conversation focused less on the weekend party itself than on the cultural atmosphere in which the incident occurred and the importance of the history of the Holocaust, in which millions of Jews and others were persecuted and killed by Nazi Germany during World War II.

“This week’s incident is not just about a few kids at a party. This is about a casual approach to the serious issue of anti-Semitism as well as bigotry of all kinds,” said Rabbi Gersh Zylberman of Temple Bat Yahm in Newport Beach. “If we remember to stand with each other as brothers and sisters, we can say no to anti-Semitism and to hate.”

“What looked like one thunder clap on Saturday night is a hurricane,” added Peter Levi, regional director for the Anti-Defamation League. “There is so much hate and we’ve got to know exactly what it is so we can do something about it.”

Times staff writers Lilly Nguyen, Matt Ormseth and Alene Tchekmedyian and Times contributor Daniel Langhorne contributed to this report.

Worst Week of Year for Stocks…

On March 14, 2019 By admin

• Breaking News

Stocks fall as weak jobs report stokes economic growth fears

Stocks fell on Friday after the U.S. government released employment data that badly missed expectations, adding to growing concerns that the global economy may be slowing down.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average pulled back 120 points as Exxon Mobil and Chevron lagged. The S&P 500 fell 0.6 percent as the energy and consumer discretionary sectors dipped. The Nasdaq Composite slid 0.56 percent.

Equities came well off their lows in late-morning trading. At its session low, the Dow was down more than 200 points.

The U.S. economy added just 20,000 jobs in last month, marking the weakest month of jobs creation since September 2017. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a gain of 180,000.

“February’s anemic 20,000 new jobs will inevitably exacerbate widespread fears of slowing economic growth, making it harder to be optimistic about corporate earnings,” said Alec Young, managing director of global market research at FTSE Russell. “All in all, there’s little in this report to excite investors.”

Treasury yields fell along with futures. The benchmark 10-year rate dipped to 2.619 percent while the 2-year yield traded at 2.45 percent.

The data come amid growing concerns about the global economy possibly slowing down. Data out of China showed its exports slumped 20.7 percent from a year earlier, far below analyst expectations and wiping out a surprise jump in January.

Analysts cautioned that data from China at the beginning of the year may be distorted by week-long Chinese New Year public holidays, which started in early February this year. In 2018, Chinese New Year holidays started in mid-February.

The weak data all come less than 24 hours after the European Central Bank slashed its growth forecasts for the euro zone and announced a new round of policy stimulus.

“Most investors would agree we are late in the cycle,” said George Schultze, founder of Schultze Asset Management. “Having said that, GDP growth remains pretty solid. We’ve had about 10 years of solid growth. … There are also a lot of things pushing it along, including accommodative monetary policy.”

Equities were on track to post rare weekly losses. The major indexes were all down more than 1.9 percent entering Friday’s session. The Nasdaq was on pace to snap a 10-week winning streak, while the Dow was set to notch its second weekly decline of the year.

The weekly decline comes amid growing fears that most of the positive news on the U.S.-China trade front may be baked in. At this point, most investors expect the two countries to strike a trade deal later this month. There are also worries that a deal may not be sure thing.

CNBC learned through sources that China and the U.S. have talked about holding further discussions in Beijing after the National People’s Congress concludes on March 15. This was first reported by The New York Times.

“A pullback in risk assets was needed, but underlying technical and fundamental conditions are positive,” Peter Perkins, partner at MRB Partners, wrote in a note to clients. “The global growth outlook remains mixed, but there are signs that economic growth momentum in China and the euro area is bottoming, while the U.S. economy continues to chug along at a moderately above-potential pace.”

—CNBC’s Kayla Tausche and Sam Meredith contributed to this report.

This Florida mayor you’ve never heard of thinks he can win the presidency

On March 14, 2019 By admin

• Breaking News

MIRAMAR, Florida — Wayne Messam is Miramar’s first black mayor. In fact, he was re-elected to a second term this week, winning 86 percent of the vote.

But now he’s considering entering a decidedly bigger race: for president of the United States. On Monday, 44-year-old Messam established an exploratory committee and is giving himself until the end of March to decide if he has the support from potential donors to officially throw his hat in the ring.

Messam is a first-generation American and a former Florida State University wide receiver who was drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals. Messam’s team sees a pathway for a young, black progressive Southerner after the surprising midterm performances of candidates like Andrew Gillum in Florida and Stacey Abrams in Georgia. South Carolina is the third stop on the Democratic nomination calendar, and Messam supporters say a strong early showing could make him a contender there.

But there’s not much time. The first Democratic primary debate is in June, and to get a spot on the stage, candidates need to create a grassroots fundraising army or start showing results in national polls. Messam starts both efforts from basically zero. But he says he’s making this run for all the right reasons.

“I’m not truly convinced solutions are coming out of Washington,” Messam told VICE News. “Mayors are known to be problem-solvers. Mayors are known for being closer to the people.”

This segment originally aired on March 13, 2019, on VICE News Tonight on HBO.