Comment by bob1029
2 days ago
Disable the fuel system cutoff controls during the takeoff climb phase of flight. Once the aircraft loses contact with the runway, these controls shouldn't function without tripping certain thresholds (speed & altitude), or following a two-man procedure that is physically impossible to execute solo. In any other flight regime, the controls function as originally designed.
The danger of a burning engine is irrelevant if you are heading into terrain.
Now you created a fuel system cutoff control inhibition system which may malfunction in its own ways, e.g., refuse to cut off fuels from a burning engine because it thinks the plane is too low due to faulty altimeter reading.
I don't think so. A moderately hard landing with an engine(s) smoldering because they were on fire but had their fuel cut off is probably survivable for most of the passengers. A moderately hard landing with the engine(s) a raging inferno pouring burning fuel all over the place because the fuel couldn't be cut off or took too long to do so is much less survivable.
Putting complex and fallible restrictions on safety-critical controls like fuel cutoff is usually a bad idea overall.
> The danger of a burning engine is irrelevant if you are heading into terrain.
Not quite. When you hit the ground you do not want any fuel leaks or hot surfaces as much as possible. That is why for example engines are shutdown when doing an emergency belly landing, to try abd prevent the airplane from bursting into flames.
Sounds good, but I'm not sure I trust Boeing outsourced software developers to implement that absolutely correctly.