The website is a general aviation news source, and a decent one. Caveats: Given the size of Boeing in the global market, I have no doubt that they cover a lot of Boeing stories. Furthermore, given the size of Boeing in the global market, I would suspect they also advertise within, causing a bias to creep in there. However, none of the major bias reporting websites indicate anything about Simply Flying being bought and paid for. Furthermore, the numbers they are reporting are not their own.
Air incident doom and gloom stories make for excellent attention grabbing articles for news organizations – clicks sell advertising, so of course they’ll publish every doom and gloom article they can find, and Boeing makes an excellent target. Statistically speaking, due to the number of Boeing planes in the air, a good percentage of aviation related incidents will involve Boeing. But, even more so, there’s now a narrative, and media organizations love articles that reinforce narratives. The narrative may be partially or wholly true, but it is often disproportionately reported.
Simple example: how many Tesla fires are reported my major media organizations, versus Ford fires, even though statistically there are far more Ford fires out there (both in terms of absolute numbers, and once normalized by the total number of vehicles). But that wouldn’t fit the narrative and thus drive clicks.
The narrative in the media is that aviation is dangerous, and Boeing in particular. But the reality is that you’re far more likely to die in a car crash on the way to the airport than you are in an aviation related incident. That, however, is not sexy to report and doesn’t drive clicks.
The reason I’m posting this is because it’s not doom and gloom. People should feel comforted getting into modern aircraft that there are a ridiculous number of safety systems, regulations, inspections, and more going on and flying is literally the safest form of transportation.
(I’d add some exceptions for private bush planes, remote access to the Arctic and Antarctic, etc., where there is added risk due to lack of infrastructure or “cowboy” outfits operating ancient equipment, like the DC-3.)
Boeing’s quality processes have shown to be very lacking and are not engineering driven, but rather cost cutting and profit driven. They could not even catch bolts MISSING from a door plug on a brand new air frame.
That is the antithesis of flight safety.
MBA’s are making decisions regarding complex engineering problems that really should be left to their betters.
Boeing richly deserves every bit of backlash heading their way. They have killed hundreds of people by slapping band aids on a 55 year old air frame in an attempt to keep it current. When they should have been working on a clean sheet design 20 years ago.
Did Boeing pay for this article?
Wall of rant incoming, sorry ;)
The website is a general aviation news source, and a decent one. Caveats: Given the size of Boeing in the global market, I have no doubt that they cover a lot of Boeing stories. Furthermore, given the size of Boeing in the global market, I would suspect they also advertise within, causing a bias to creep in there. However, none of the major bias reporting websites indicate anything about Simply Flying being bought and paid for. Furthermore, the numbers they are reporting are not their own.
Air incident doom and gloom stories make for excellent attention grabbing articles for news organizations – clicks sell advertising, so of course they’ll publish every doom and gloom article they can find, and Boeing makes an excellent target. Statistically speaking, due to the number of Boeing planes in the air, a good percentage of aviation related incidents will involve Boeing. But, even more so, there’s now a narrative, and media organizations love articles that reinforce narratives. The narrative may be partially or wholly true, but it is often disproportionately reported.
Simple example: how many Tesla fires are reported my major media organizations, versus Ford fires, even though statistically there are far more Ford fires out there (both in terms of absolute numbers, and once normalized by the total number of vehicles). But that wouldn’t fit the narrative and thus drive clicks.
The narrative in the media is that aviation is dangerous, and Boeing in particular. But the reality is that you’re far more likely to die in a car crash on the way to the airport than you are in an aviation related incident. That, however, is not sexy to report and doesn’t drive clicks.
The reason I’m posting this is because it’s not doom and gloom. People should feel comforted getting into modern aircraft that there are a ridiculous number of safety systems, regulations, inspections, and more going on and flying is literally the safest form of transportation.
(I’d add some exceptions for private bush planes, remote access to the Arctic and Antarctic, etc., where there is added risk due to lack of infrastructure or “cowboy” outfits operating ancient equipment, like the DC-3.)
Boeing’s quality processes have shown to be very lacking and are not engineering driven, but rather cost cutting and profit driven. They could not even catch bolts MISSING from a door plug on a brand new air frame.
That is the antithesis of flight safety.
MBA’s are making decisions regarding complex engineering problems that really should be left to their betters.
Boeing richly deserves every bit of backlash heading their way. They have killed hundreds of people by slapping band aids on a 55 year old air frame in an attempt to keep it current. When they should have been working on a clean sheet design 20 years ago.