> Why didn't they? I do not know, and none of the accounts I've read addressed this.
I can give you a good hunch as to why.
Because the absolute last thing a pilot wants to do with a plane load of people is experiment. That's what a simulator is for.
I stumbled across the "suppress MCAS by trim switch spamming" within the first few seconds after I read a complete description of the system's functionality.
It took a complete description of the problem, and a background in programming/systems design, engineering, and an enthusiast+ level of aviation familiarity to come to that course of action in that amount of time, under ideal information processing conditions, with the initial information uptake immediately prior to the advent of reasoning.
Airline pilots had how to fly, and no information initially that there were dragons there, and even once they knew, they had no way to try to build new situational reflexes due to the lack of availability of accurate MAX simulators, because Boeing fought tooth and nail to get the regulator to agree that they weren't necessary.
They had to manually fault inject on an NG simulator to even get an understanding of the conditions involved.
Military pilot training, from my understamding, bypasses the simulator, and dumps you into the seat of some of the most disagreeable aircraft ever designed, with an instructor who sabotages you regularly, leaving you in a spin, and you have 30 seconds to recover please. Begin.
In that case, it's you, and the a-hole who just put you in a flat spin. Experiment away. Not 100+ innocent civilians depending on your ability to reason through what this damn plane is doing.
Point being, information about the airframe was withheld due to an absolutely crushing need by Boeing for the aircraft to not require even the smallest degree of retraining.
The pilots were absolutely not at fault for not being able or willing to experiment at the drop of a hat with a system they suddenly realized they had no way to understand.
Putting them in that position in the first place is undeniably Boeing's fault.
I can give you a good hunch as to why.
Because the absolute last thing a pilot wants to do with a plane load of people is experiment. That's what a simulator is for.
I stumbled across the "suppress MCAS by trim switch spamming" within the first few seconds after I read a complete description of the system's functionality.
It took a complete description of the problem, and a background in programming/systems design, engineering, and an enthusiast+ level of aviation familiarity to come to that course of action in that amount of time, under ideal information processing conditions, with the initial information uptake immediately prior to the advent of reasoning.
Airline pilots had how to fly, and no information initially that there were dragons there, and even once they knew, they had no way to try to build new situational reflexes due to the lack of availability of accurate MAX simulators, because Boeing fought tooth and nail to get the regulator to agree that they weren't necessary.
They had to manually fault inject on an NG simulator to even get an understanding of the conditions involved.
Military pilot training, from my understamding, bypasses the simulator, and dumps you into the seat of some of the most disagreeable aircraft ever designed, with an instructor who sabotages you regularly, leaving you in a spin, and you have 30 seconds to recover please. Begin.
In that case, it's you, and the a-hole who just put you in a flat spin. Experiment away. Not 100+ innocent civilians depending on your ability to reason through what this damn plane is doing.
Point being, information about the airframe was withheld due to an absolutely crushing need by Boeing for the aircraft to not require even the smallest degree of retraining.
The pilots were absolutely not at fault for not being able or willing to experiment at the drop of a hat with a system they suddenly realized they had no way to understand.
Putting them in that position in the first place is undeniably Boeing's fault.