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Originally Posted by Maksutov
If the landing gear had been manufactured in accordance with Six Sigma and/or Lean, it would have collapsed the second it experienced any unusual stresses that weren't part of the conventional landing profile specification. Any safety factors to account such out-of-spec performance issues would have been eliminated by the Black Belts and bean counters during the design phase in order to minimize cost and maximize profits.
If properly investigated, I'm sure it'll be a pink slip for the engineer(s) who wasted such valuable resources and potentially had a negative effect on company profits.
Meanwhile, congrats to the crew for a successful landing, the flight controllers who brought them in safely to the best runway available for this situation, and the emergency response personnel who were ready just in case.  |
I'm sorry, but the way I (aerospace engineer) was learned Lean manufacturing, we never sacrificed anything concerning safety. Efficiency of the plant was the central point. The removal of any waste (with "waste" having a complex definition here
). So only the things that aren't value-adding should be discarded. Making a nose gear strong enough so it can hold up when the wheels are blocked (or turend 90°) is certainly value-adding. Whether extra safety measures survive the pro-con (gain, chance of occurence, cost, weight...) tradeoff is a matter where lean principles should stay away from. Extra safety is not waste, hence not discarded by lean principles.
That's the mesage they gave us at least.