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Boeing and the FAA proceed on these things as a partnership. Boeing has their name on the line, and they have way more engineers and other technical specialists than the FAA. In the past, Boeing has essentially written the specs that must be adhered to by all equipment producers, and, once the FAA approves those specs and procedures, ensures that they are followed. This book gets into how this worked with the 747:

https://www.amazon.com/747-Creating-Worlds-Adventures-Aviati...

⬐ wahern

Boeing is part of a duopoly. If a Boeing plane falls out of the sky, most people would chalk it up to the inherent danger in air travel rather than to fault Boeing specifically.

OTOH, part of the reason the duopoly persists is because of heavy regulation, and specifically the strict safety regimen. From that angle Boeing has significant economic motivation to promote costly safety margins, particularly those which raise barriers to entry into their markets.

I understand the argument that Boeing employs countless conscientious, professional engineers. But in 2018, with American business culture having internalized decades of cynical, anti-social business practices, I'd be careful about overestimating the influence of the professional class.

⬐ jedrek

I've flown on more Bombardiers and Embraers than Airbuses or Boeings in the past 10 years.

⬐ wahern

Bombardier effectively went broke trying to break into the the low-end of the Boeing-Airbus market with the CSeries, no?

I found that odd because, as you say, they certainly have the expertise and track record for seemingly comparable projects. To provide evidence for the hypothesis (which is a larger theme in political economics) it would be interesting to see what the precise engineering and management hurdles were as compared to smaller aircraft, especially the marginal cost. The crux of the hypothesis would be that techniques needed to remain competitive in Boeing's market--e.g. foldable wings--would be regulated in a way that made them especially costly to develop and gain regulatory approval.

⬐ walrus01

> OTOH, part of the reason the duopoly persists is because of heavy regulation

Also because Boeing was ultimately more successful than the third competitor in the market. Boeing sold many aircraft during a period in time when the DC-10's reliability was deeply questionable in its early years, due to some aircraft design/engineering related fatalities that killed hundreds of people. There have been a shitload of fatal Boeing accidents including things like the 747-vs-747 crash in the canary islands, a Japanese airline 747 that flew into a mountain, etc, but those were all caused by human factors.

There have been very few large fatality crashes that can be directly traced back to an inherent design flaw in a Boeing plane.

⬐ dingaling

Just a couple from memory:

There were several fatal 737 accidents due to uncommanded rudder actuation.

The earlier 707 also had several cashes linked to rudder design and the UK CAA required design changes before it was permitted on the UK register.

Joe Sutter, lead engineer and PM for the 747, wrote a nice autobiography "747: Creating the World's First Jumbo Jet"

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0060882425/

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1267151.747

The considerations for redundancy, safety, and testing for these huge passenger jets is quite striking compared to, say, the Skunkworks book.

Recommended.

Would highly recommend this book by Joe Sutter the engineering leader for the 747 program: http://www.amazon.com/747-Creating-Worlds-Adventures-Aviatio...

⬐ dekhn

Great book! I learned a lot from that (already was a huge 747 fan). In particular, compare the Boeing SST project at the time to the 747. It's obvious in hindsight why an efficient high capacity plane beat an inefficient low capacity plane- people want cheap tickets more than they want to get the destination in the least amount of time (hell, you can spend as much time in car traffic at the destination as you did in the air!).

IIRC, they had a lot of problems with engine failures, as the 747 really pushed engine technology and size at the time. Joe Sutter's book [1] is an interesting look at the history of the 747 design (he was the lead designer).

There was also an issue with the wing resonating, which they fixed by putting trim weights in the wing of the 747-100 made of depleted uranium.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/747-Creating-Worlds-Adventures-Aviatio...