Since the grounding of the Boeing 737 MAX was first lifted, the airplane has
made a strident return to the fleets of dozens of airlines worldwide. Despite
all the worries about the reputational damage from two high-profile accidents,
Boeing’s flagship narrowbody has been inducted back into service with confidence.
Since November 2020, Boeing has also logged 1,215 gross orders for the MAX, 360 in this year alone
(as of the end of July 2022). Boeing has been hard at work to get its outstanding orders delivered to
customers as well, with 476 airplanes flying out of the factory to customers since December 2020.
With around 45 airlines flying the MAX today, the aircraft has been thoroughly put through
its paces over the last year and a half. So how is it performing? Let’s take a look in today’s video…
Stan Deal, CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, tells Simple Flying:
“The 737 MAX fleet has operated for 1.8 million flight hours – about 800,000
flights – since November 2020. Fleet reliability is above 99.5% - that is
actually where the Next-Generation 737 was at, so it's on par with the airplane it's replaced.”
As with any new airplane type, there are often some teething problems. Previous issues aside, the
reported faults with the MAX have been as expected and non-safety critical. Deal told Simple Flying,
“We're in that what I would call a normal routine of having fleet team
meetings with every customer in attendance, to say, ‘Where are your top fleet issues?’
Then we work on those issues - what are the things that we need to improve on.”
This could range from minor software updates to problems with components. If the issue is found to
be widespread, Boeing will offer a fix and issue a service bulletin to advise all its customers to
implement the fix. In some cases, an Airworthiness Directive (A.D.) from the FAA is issued, which
means all US carriers at least have to undertake the fix within a specified period of time.
Since returning in late 2020, the MAX has had a handful of ADs implemented. This included a
fix to electrical grounding; a fuel shutoff issue needing a new processor and relevant
software update, and this year, an AD was issued regarding radio altimeters and 5G interference.
None of these problems are safety-critical and
pale in comparison to the routine ADs issued for other, older aircraft types.
Boeing is keen to weed out any minor faults with the 737 MAX in a proactive
manner. As well as regular meetings with the MAX operators, the company chose to
take health monitoring of the fleet into its own hands, as Stan Deal explained,
“We deliberately put our Aircraft Health Monitoring on every 737 MAX as they return
to service. Before, that was a feature that each customer could select. We said that
was a strategy of returning the fleet that we should do … I get a cloud report on aircraft
health that is invaluable to our engineers to be able to diagnose and then get feedback.”
Having this regular, timely feedback allows Boeing to rapidly identify any
trends or underlying problems, and to take the lead in developing the fixes needed.
So, with almost 800,000 revenue flights under its belt, the MAX has regained the confidence
of many- even those who vowed ‘never set foot on a MAX again’ back in 2019.
But what abou you? Have you been on a MAX yet? Do the stats ease
your safety concerns? Let us know in the comments.