'What the Truth Is': FAA Safety Engineer Slams Oversight of Boeing's 737 MAX (seattletimes.com) 72
The Seattle Times reports:
Haunted by the two deadly crashes of Boeing 737 MAX jets and his agency's role in approving the plane, veteran Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) safety engineer Joe Jacobsen is stepping forward publicly to give the victims' families "a firsthand account of what the truth is." In a detailed letter sent last month to a family that lost their daughter in the second MAX crash in Ethiopia two years ago this week, and in interviews with The Seattle Times, Jacobsen gave the first personal account by an insider of the federal safety agency's response to the MAX crashes...
He believes additional system upgrades are needed beyond Boeing's fix for the MAX that was blessed by the FAA and other regulators.
And Jacobsen argues that the plane would be safer if Boeing simply removed altogether the new software — the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) — that went wrong in the two crashes that killed 346 people. Jacobsen also calls for the replacement of some of the people at "the highest levels of FAA management," whom he blames for creating a culture too concerned with fulfilling the demands of industry. In his letter and interview, Jacobsen also described in more depth than previously reported how an autothrottle system issue may have contributed to the crash in Ethiopia in March 2019.
Boeing and the FAA said in separate statements they believe the MAX is fixed and safe, and that regulators worldwide have validated this conclusion...
A week after the Lion Air crash on Oct. 29, 2018, Jacobsen received an email from a colleague asking if there was an issue paper on MCAS. "This was the first day that I heard about MCAS," he wrote. "We had no issue papers, and if we had, I would have been the engineer responsible for providing technical content and comment on such an issue paper." When he did get a look at the system, Jacobsen said he was "shocked to discover that the airplane was purposely designed and certified to use just one AOA (Angle of Attack) input for a flight critical function."
If given the chance during the original certification, he's certain that he and "6 to 8 of our most experienced engineers in the Seattle office" would have identified that as a serious design flaw because there's "a long history of AOA sensor failures."
Instead, Boeing minimized MCAS and kept the details of its assessment to itself...
The article also argues that Boeing itself didn't grasp the danger of its system. "Michael Teal, 737 MAX chief engineer, testified to Congress that he first learned only after the Lion Air crash that MCAS relied on a single sensor.
He believes additional system upgrades are needed beyond Boeing's fix for the MAX that was blessed by the FAA and other regulators.
And Jacobsen argues that the plane would be safer if Boeing simply removed altogether the new software — the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) — that went wrong in the two crashes that killed 346 people. Jacobsen also calls for the replacement of some of the people at "the highest levels of FAA management," whom he blames for creating a culture too concerned with fulfilling the demands of industry. In his letter and interview, Jacobsen also described in more depth than previously reported how an autothrottle system issue may have contributed to the crash in Ethiopia in March 2019.
Boeing and the FAA said in separate statements they believe the MAX is fixed and safe, and that regulators worldwide have validated this conclusion...
A week after the Lion Air crash on Oct. 29, 2018, Jacobsen received an email from a colleague asking if there was an issue paper on MCAS. "This was the first day that I heard about MCAS," he wrote. "We had no issue papers, and if we had, I would have been the engineer responsible for providing technical content and comment on such an issue paper." When he did get a look at the system, Jacobsen said he was "shocked to discover that the airplane was purposely designed and certified to use just one AOA (Angle of Attack) input for a flight critical function."
If given the chance during the original certification, he's certain that he and "6 to 8 of our most experienced engineers in the Seattle office" would have identified that as a serious design flaw because there's "a long history of AOA sensor failures."
Instead, Boeing minimized MCAS and kept the details of its assessment to itself...
The article also argues that Boeing itself didn't grasp the danger of its system. "Michael Teal, 737 MAX chief engineer, testified to Congress that he first learned only after the Lion Air crash that MCAS relied on a single sensor.
root of the problem (Score:4, Insightful)
The root of the problem is the American culture of greed and cover-up, as well as a failure of its political system and institution.
If that happened in China, that's what you would read from the media and slashdot commentator. Given that it happened to a US company, we just need to blame Boeing.
In China, the highest exec of the company, such as Sanlu's General Manager in the milk powder scandal, the would be sentenced to life in prison while the ones directly responsible got death sentence, such as the farmers who sold taint milk to Sanlu. In the US, the CEO, such as Muilenberg, walked away with a golden parachute worth millions [cnbc.com].
Re: (Score:3)
At least read the summary. There is a quote from him saying that the first time he even heard of MCAS was a week AFTER. You also presume that he had any authority or ability to raise the issue with anyone other than the pigeons on his window sill.
Re: (Score:3)
From TFS: "Michael Teal, 737 MAX chief engineer, testified to Congress that he first learned only after the Lion Air crash that MCAS relied on a single sensor.
Lots of people now see the problem at Boeing.
Re: (Score:1)
From TFS: "Michael Teal, 737 MAX chief engineer, testified to Congress that he first learned only after the Lion Air crash that MCAS relied on a single sensor.
So Michael Teal never knew the ability to cross check with the second AOA sensor was a Paid Upgrade? And the "AoA Disagree" warning light was also only operational if an airline purchased the Paid Upgrade? I call bullshit.
Boeing didn’t plan to fix 737 MAX warning light until 2020 [seattletimes.com]
Re: (Score:2)
I think I see the problem at Boeing.
They hired you to shill for them?
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
What leads you to believe this is a phenomena unique to America? Ever read about the Volkswagen emissions scandal, the one reported to have released over 1 millon tons of extra pollution into the atmosphere?
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
> What leads you to believe this is a phenomena unique to America?
Why would any answer to that matter? Whatabouteveryone-elseism is noise.
Re: (Score:3)
What leads you to believe this is a phenomena unique to America?
They never said it was unique to America. What leads you to believe that something leads them to believe that?
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
What leads you to believe this is a phenomena unique to America?
When did I say this unique to America? I'm questioning why the western media and average Joes never mention that this phenomena is not unique to China when shit occurs over there.
The American arrogance, ignorance, bias against its rivals do definitely exacerbate lies on things that really matters, i.e. those connected to high profits for somebody. Just a few examples: the Pearl harbor intel cover-up, the Tonkin Bay lie that led to Vietnam War, the 15-year-old girl coached to claim Iraqi soldiers killing bab [bbc.com]
Re:root of the problem (Score:5, Informative)
In China, the highest exec of the company, such as Sanlu's General Manager in the milk powder scandal, the would be sentenced to life in prison while the ones directly responsible got death sentence,
Sure, if things are disastrous enough, the party will start throwing people under the bus. But China is hardly a paragon of restraining corporate bad actors. In the Sanlu case the scandal ignited fury against the government, inflamed Taiwan independence sentiment, and endangered Beijing's Olympic plans, so some heads, more or less literally, had to roll. Non-party heads, though.
The government knew about the problem years before it blew up on them and swept it under the rug, overruling foreign Sanlu investors' demands for a product recall and censoring press reports of the problem. When the scandal grew too big to control, they had to make examples of people, and the ones who got the most severe treatment were nobodies -- farmers. Party members who worked for the company got prison, even though they were arguably as, if not *more* culpable. Government officials who actively suppressed the news and prevented anything from being done for years didn't get punished at all, although a nominal number were removed from their posts.
This is why you need an independent judiciary and professional prosecutors whose loyalty is *not* to party first. Defending party members is normal party behavior. It's also why we need to guard against elected officials meddling in prosecution decisions. Elected officials in our system have only *indirect* control, through policy-setting; they don't get to make decisions on who gets prosecuted for what.
Re: (Score:3)
At least the Chinese government has the decency to pretend it cares. The US government doesn't even do that, and it hides behind the "we're elected, so we don't have power" excuse.
Re: (Score:2)
It still helps that America has a free press (for the time being) and a non-political civil service.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Sure, if things are disastrous enough, the party will start throwing people under the bus.
Even if things are disastrous enough, the American political regime will not throw VIPs under the bus. Don't believe that? Check the status of Michael Muilenberg, Colin Powell, Dick Cheney, Donal Rumsfeld, George Bush Jr., ... It will throw whistle blowing little guys under the bus, however; ask Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, Julian Assange.
How many lives have lost between Pearl Harbor thru Vietnam to Iraq War before their hoaxes/cover-ups were exposed?
Yeah, maybe that's the little difference between the
Re: (Score:2)
Even if things are disastrous enough, the American political regime will not throw VIPs under the bus.
Ford pardoned Nixon but not any of his henchmen.
Re: (Score:2)
Ford pardoned Nixon but not any of his henchmen.
yeah, the henchmen were the disposables thrown under the bus, while the VIP Nixon was protected.
Thank you for proving my point.
Re: (Score:2)
independent judiciary and professional prosecutors whose loyalty is *not* to party first. :P
But something they do not have in the US either.
There they get elected. And getting reelected is based on performance. And performance is based on convictions, regardless if the culprit is guilty or not.
At least every second US crime movie tells us that
Re: (Score:2)
Depends on the state.
Re: (Score:3)
Stop spitting out those lies .. (Score:2)
True: If that happened in China .. Some people would have been executed for sure. Mine operators in the past were executed for safety related deaths.
But when you look at China in-depth you will see so much corruption that the American greed looks like nothing compared to that.
And in this contrast those executions in a system of corruption(think off the stories about Pooh the bear and his family's wealth) look like executing scapegoats to cover up a major problem in the system - especially when you need thos
I just call bullshit to this self description. (Score:2)
this doesn't mean I'm in support of either. But I simply call out the chinese economic system to be lie.
Are you that "non-understanding"?
Or are you proud of your Confederate Flag in your garage and your all white neighbourhood?
Perhaps you get the sarcasm?
Re: (Score:2)
Look at how China miss-handled the Corona-outbreak .. covering up till it is impossible.
The only cover up was the local government did not report quickly enough to its superiors.
That no one in the west paid attention is hardly a cover up. I suspected the problem around October 2019, knew the problem around November 2019. And was in Thailand both times. If you did not, it is more your problem and not Chinas fault.
I mean: Vietnam closed its border to China November or December 2019. Everyone who is in any gov
Re:root of the problem (Score:4, Interesting)
Truth, it was primarily their political system and institutions that allowed Boeing to self-regulate, and this was the inevitable consequence, since all countries have a culture of greed and cover-ups, some just give it more room to operate than others.
The people who benefited from the savings of outsourcing the MCAS' programming to people who were unfamiliar with the concepts of redundant systems and failsafes will retire to lives of luxury in a non-extraditing jurisdiction if any attempts are made to hold them meaningfully accountable. Preventing future failures of the same type by not falling for the idea of self-regulation again is all that can be done now.
In China They'd Execute a Politcal Fall-Guy (Score:2)
In China, they find the most convenient person to blame and give him life in prison and or execution. ..which is why this kind of thing is so much more common in Chinese industries and never actually gets better.
--Matthew
Nothing is 100% safe (Score:2)
Can it be made safer and still provide a useful and accessible service at a reasonable cost ? Fools will think I am advocating unsafe planes, what I am saying is you want provable safe flying it is not going to happen. There will always be things that are impossible to prove safe. Heck a meteor could strike me while I am typing this. Or one of you idiots may call me a troll. I just have to accept that risk for the sake of spreading logic and knowledge.
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Nothing is 100% safe (Score:5, Insightful)
Nothing is 100% safe, but this could and should have been safer if Boeing hadn't tried to pass off a DAL-A functionality without redundancy as a minor change, and if the FAA hadn't greenlit it without even looking, is the point.
Incidentally, someone needs to spend many years in the slammer for this - mostly likely the Boing QA dude who's normally penally responsible on anything he signs, and the FAA dude who vetted his work. It still hasn't happened yet. That's astonishing to me, and damages the FAA's credibility greatly for anybody who's worked in that industry. I can tell you this would never have happened with the EASA.
Re:Nothing is 100% safe (Score:4, Insightful)
Also a top tier manager or two at Boeing. Penalising low level techies is not enough to get greedy managers from pressuring people below them to do the wrong thing. It is only when the daughters of top brass can no longer go to pony club that behaviour will change.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
The question is never "is it absolutely safe". It's a very complicated question in practice, but there are well-documented maximum frequencies for hazards as a function of worst-case severity. Potentially catastrophic failures -- multiple fatalities -- usually have to be mitigated so that they are not expected to happen over the total life of the aircraft model being certified. Hazardous effects -- potential single fatality other than a member of flight crew, serious reduction in safety margins, etc. --
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Can it be made safer and still provide a useful and accessible service at a reasonable cost ? Fools will think I am advocating unsafe planes, what I am saying is you want provable safe flying it is not going to happen. There will always be things that are impossible to prove safe. Heck a meteor could strike me while I am typing this. Or one of you idiots may call me a troll. I just have to accept that risk for the sake of spreading logic and knowledge.
The problem is that people assume the best-case scenario and overlook or ignore safety problems. They can resist it, but when costs and deadlines are a constant factor protecting against hypothetical events that haven't happened will be overlooked.
That's why you need arm's length regulators who overlook the industry as a whole, they care less about the deadlines and budgets and so can actually keep enforcing reasonable standards.
But that's also why you need to make sure they keep arm's length, especially wh
Re: (Score:2)
On the other hand, some things are obviously safer than others. Look at a ladder with three broken rungs and obvious termite damage vs new ladder right next to it. Gee, I wonder which one is more likely to be safe?
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Nothing is 100% safe (Score:5, Insightful)
> Therefore using a single sensor should have been enough,
Bullshit. For something that can take over flight controls entirely, you do not rely on a single sensor. End of story.
Re: (Score:2)
That's exactly the bait-and-switch Boeing pulled when selling this thing: "It flies exactly like a regular 737, so you don't have to retrain your pilots. Oh, that single sensor point of failure? No biggie, if it fails, just disable MCAS". You can see how that is attractive to low-margin companies like LionAir.
Of course pilots have to recognise a failing MCAS, and be able to turn it off, and be able to manually correct whatever inputs MCAS had given. And without MCAS, the plane behaves differently, but it no
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
They know how to do the math and determine the number of 9's in their safety calculation.
About every standard for safety regardless across what industry places specific constraints onto *how* to design something when that number hits 3 9's. Standards and industry recognise that math doesn't create safety and say that at this point regardless if your device is made of magic unobtanium you better fucking have 2 of them. If you can't figure out what to do with 2, add a third.
The augmentation system (software and hardware) was not considered essential for correct operation of the aircraft, that is to say that even with it disabled, the crew should have been able to fly the aircraft through a safe takeoff and landing. Therefore using a single sensor should have been enough, or so the usual logic goes.
The only way that logic applies is if you can detect all the failure modes. If you can't detect the failure modes then how d
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Then maybe you should read my post again if you think I'm agreeing with yours. Specifically on that last line you're wrong about us having a reliability problem with humans. We have a reliability problem with hardware. What they got wrong is not yielding to the humans. That does not mean as you implied that aircraft systems are too complex for humans to fly the plane.
Unless your point was that aircraft systems are too complex for humans to know how to disable them, in which yes but *ONLY* on the 737MAX, and
Re: (Score:2)
Perhaps I wasn't clear. I am not saying that the aircraft are too complex out of necessity. Boeing, and others, have just made them that way. Like in the case of the MAX. The augmentation system isn't necessary to fly the aircraft, but they put it in anyway, adding complexity, so they could claim enough similarity for common pilot cert. However, most of the computerized functions in the airliner are there for a reason. If you want to put a flight engineer back in every airliner, and then put a dedicated nav
Re:Nothing is 100% safe (Score:5, Informative)
Ridiculous nonsense. Relying on a *single sensor* in a system that can completely override the controls?
Not even *non-autonomous cars* do this. They routinely have redundancy built into sensors and cross check for plausibility, if only to prevent your motor from grenading - something that would just cause your car to stop, not kill 300 people.
Why is this so difficult to for people to get? The single AoA sensor was quite literally the first thing I noticed, and I don't know anything about flight control systems.
This has nothing to do with "well everything has risk" and more to do with "omg people are fucking stupid if they think this is ok."
Re: (Score:3)
You are way, way, way overthinking things.
The basic 737-MAX aircraft itself was sound, but flew differently from previous versions of the 737. That difference allowed for the possibility of overeager throttling while in a steep climb to leading to a fatal stall. That was both provably possible and obviously bad enough that mitigation was necessary. This is simple Risk Management 101 stuff, so far.
There were two possible mitigations: (1) the human one (train the pilots to fly the aircraft properly), (2) t
Re: Nothing is 100% safe (Score:2)
They need to expose enough of the system that pilots can understand the failure mode. Not hide it and pretend they can just treat failure as a run away trim, because it has the same procedures to ameliorate the problem, when it behaves entirely differently.
More than the single sensor, more than the fact the system is an ugly hack to avoid pilot recertification, the obfuscation is in my opinion the greatest sin.
"..just one input for a flight critical function" (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Two sensors lets you gracefully degrade: if two sensors disagree, or one of the sensors is clearly out of range, etc., you automatically disable whatever it is that needs them; it's not possible with two sensors do determine which one is correct if they disagree.
If you want availability, you need three sensors, unless the thing you want available isn't so critical and it's acceptable to operate in a limited manner with potentially unreliable sensor data.
Re: (Score:2)
Boeing is generally cheaping out on sensors, even in their newest designs.
Re:"..just one input for a flight critical functio (Score:5, Informative)
Maybe the key distinction here is whether MCAS was flight critical. You can fly without it.
MCAS wasn't flight critical; it was sales critical. Without MCAS, the airframe changes in the 737 MAX would have altered its flight response enough to require a new type rating. The Airbus A320 neo only required a Type B training update, which meant no expensive simulator time; Boeing needed the 737 MAX to fly like the 737 NGs, so it could get by with a Type B training update as well -- they were looking at up to a 30% loss in market share for that class of airliner unless they could make the cost of transitioning from 737 NGs to A320 neos prohibitive. If the pilot retraining cost was the same between the 737 MAX and A320 neo, that removed the barrier to switching.
Re:"..just one input for a flight critical functio (Score:5, Informative)
The problems are multiple. MCAS wasn't documented at all. Pilots didn't even know it existed until after the first crash. The second problem is that it couldn't be disengaged without also disengaging a system (electric trim) helpful in recovering from the bad behavior of the malfunctioning MCAS. Third, the AOA disagree warning was incorrectly disabled on planes where the digital AOA reading display option wasn't included.
Re: (Score:2)
Maybe the key distinction here is whether MCAS was flight critical. You can fly without it. I thought the issue was pilots were not properly trained to recognize what MCAS is doing and turn it off if needed, which still seems potentially better than having two sensors and persisting in the assumption one will always be working and the system will always be able to determine which is working.
The problem is MCAS engaged and took action based on a single point of failure. Yes, pilot training s important but to rely on that during critical portions of flight as the result of a design that allowed a single point of failure to force pilots into an emergency response is poor design. Two sensors with different readings would not necessarily require selecting which one is right but issuing a warning to pilots and not engaging. An even better design is a 2 out of 3 system, perhaps using other inputs t
Big Red Button (Score:2)
Why rely on a shutdown checklist instead of having a big red "manual control" emergency button? At least they would have been able to selectively reenable the automatic systems one at a time until they found the first faulty one.
For any complex system that's malfunctioning you revert to the most minimal viable state and then add back complexity. Relying on checklists in a panic situation is fragile. Lion Air could have leveled off at a safe speed and THEN figured out that the autothrottle was effed.
Unplugging HAL non trivial (Score:3)
At least in Clarke's novelization, Bowman was guessing at how much of HAL was safe to shut down.
Go over to pprune.org and check out the recent thread on the loss of an Indonesian 737-500.
There, the "automatics" may have reached some "trip" conditions causing them to disconnect, startling the pilots by turning over control "here, you've got it" with the plane already halfway out-of-control.
Before you install that Big Red Button to unplug HAL, a person could talk to flight crews as to whether that func
Re:Unplugging HAL non trivial (Score:5, Insightful)
I think it is pretty clear that the MCAS was a money-saving "patch" to avoid retraining pilots for the newer 737 model. Whether it was to save on retraining or if it was to meet a hard FAA requirement on "increasing control pull" up to the stall is not certain. How it came to be given that much authority to dial in that much pitch-down trim has never been disclosed.
As to "Boeing should have designed an all-new aircraft instead of tinkering with the 1960's design of the 737" also needs to consider that an all new design could have introduce all new problems. The swept wing that enable jets to fly as fast as they do, by itself, introduces a raft of aerodynamic control problems that are mitigated by a bunch of "patches and bug fixes."
Maybe, just maybe, the current Boeing management culture doesn't allow the engineers, the test pilots and the FAA to engage in the free discussions that key people "have the picture" of all that is going on. But as to "the bean counters did this", all commercial products have financial constraints on them, otherwise the company making the product will go out of business. ...
A lot of engineering is figuring out what is possible given the physical, and yes, financial, political and social constraints. A lot of people here are missing this.
And the purpose of safety regulation is to prevent the people making financial decisions from compromising the social considerations - like flight safety.
MCAS is what killed people, but the whole attitude of the FAA was to hand out waivers to make this plane proposal (as it started out, before money and time was invested) to make it fly because Boeing management, which was caught napping, wanted to jump into a market segment fast that Airbus was going to own.
For example those huge new engines slapped on to an old airframe do not meet FAA ground clearance rules. Solution? Well, there is no technical fix for this - the solution was to say "Breaking safety standards? Well that's okay, we'll just pretend the safety standard does not exist."
The FAA would have been doing Boeing, its workers, the Washington state economy, and 346 people and their loved ones a favor by nixing the project at the outset. Instead the mindset was "this plane will be approved in the form that Boeing regards as the most marketable" and bent rules and watered down procedures to make it happen. The certification was a foregone conclusion.
The recert for flying after the MCAS disaster focused only on this one problem, and its fix. The entire certification of this airplane is suspect and it should be redone from the ground up, with no presumption that it will fly again.
Cite on ground clearance (Score:1)
I did a quick Web search on the ground-clearance waiver, and the only cite that turned up was a Slashdot post by user careysub.
Re: (Score:2)
> How it came to be given that much authority to dial in that much pitch-down trim has never been disclosed.
This is not even close to what should be the foremost question on everyone's mind. The foremost question should be "why does MCAS, a subsystem that can impose unlimited pitch down trim, rely on a single sensor with absolutely no plausibility checking"
The fact that this is *not* the most obvious question to literally everyone is why so many people are dead.
Regardless of how much trim it had authorit
Re: (Score:2)
Succintly put. From the outside it smells so wrong. Plus, both crashes stemmed from a (single) faulty AOA sensor. The armchair aero engineer in me thinks that the sensor itself might not be very robust. If the sensor is essentially just a metal surface that orientates to airflow, how hard can it be to make that device basically bombproof? It either moves with the flow and the sends back its position, or it's broken.
In screens we trust. (Score:3)
Technology, particularly "digital" and its related Internet, has been such a boon that we assume it can (and should) do anything. So many of us are ready and willing to risk anything it requires of us, our privacy, even our lives. But even people in tech. bow to it though they know that the more we add, the more there is complexity--when complexity should be our enemy. Complexity will cause failures and suffering.
I could on and on, giving examples of simple things that have been made complex "because reasons", but I don't want to get into it with everyone defending their pet product because it helps them do X, despite the ignored, significant resources that were used to create the thing in the first place (and then maintain it forever).
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler." - Albert Einstein
Re: (Score:3)
This has nothing to do with MCAS being overly complex. This has to do with them relying on a single sensor in a system that could *override the flight deck*.
Even the most trivial, simple, implementation of this will kill someone if the single sensor fails.
Re: (Score:2)
Bean counters & Bureaucrats making decisions (Score:2)
Failure is foreseeable and inevitable with f***ed up priorities and no accountability.
Much as I've Long Loved Beoing, Beoing in Broken. (Score:2)
Obviously, the culture in Beoing's management has changed so severely for the worse and, sadly, in a way that seems increasingly common in so many industries.
Bean counting systems oriented toward determining, with ever increasing levels of detail, the exact work each person is or isn't doing and its relation to costs and profitability, etc. Managers love numbers to show off. And so many MBA's and professional project managers are so busy engineering workflows. People finish what they have to do, mark it
Re: (Score:2)
> should there not be a simple way to take full manual control of any aircraft
I keep seeing this as the most common question, which astounds me.
Your question should be "why does a system that can take control of the plane rely on a single sensor with absolutely zero plausibility checking"?
The mere fact that this is not the most obvious question tells me a lot about why so many fucking people are dead.