Boeing has disclosed details of a software update to its 737 Max that the company says eliminates the chance erroneous data can cause on-board computers to place the aircraft into a dive. The company has already developed the software and tested it inflight, and is now working to achieve certification of the changes from federal authorities, Boeing officials said Wednesday. "This combination of things will eliminate the chance of erroneous data ever causing MCAS activation," says a Boeing official who declined to be identified. Company officials frame the MCAS modifications as improvements to an already safe system, saying the updates do not represent any concession by Boeing that the 737 Max was unsafe to begin with. Boeing declined to speculate a timeline by which the changes might be certified. <br/>
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It would cost US$1.8b and take 10,000 new employees for the FAA to handle all aircraft certification internally, the agency's acting chief told a Senate panel Wednesday, facing tough questions after 2 Boeing 737 MAX crashes on how new planes are approved for flight. The FAA delegates much of the work of airplane certification to manufacturers under a decades-old process. The FAA has agreed to significantly improve its oversight of organisations performing certifications on its behalf by July 2019, US DoT inspector general Calvin Scovel said. "There have been long standing concerns that have been raised about the closeness of the FAA with Boeing" senator Ted Cruz said after the hearing. "At this point we don't know that's what caused this, but on the face of it, it certainly seems inadequate," Cruz added. <br/>
Air traffic controllers at Sydney Airport are so stretched that flights have to be restricted once a month on average as there are not enough staff to safely manage the congested runways. Amid claims the workforce has been stretched to breaking point, figures reveal an almost 50% increase in the total overtime hours worked by air traffic controllers at Sydney Airport over the past 3 years. That dramatic increase at Sydney Airport came as the number of overtime hours worked at other major Australian airports, and across Airservice’s operators as a whole, has fallen over the past 3 years. Figures show operations at Sydney were disrupted – with flights either delayed or cancelled – on 14 occasions in 2018 because there were not enough air traffic controllers available. That is up from 4 times in 2017 and 12 times in 2016. <br/>