[morganw]

Reminder that McDonnell-Douglas, operating as Boeing, owns Boeing Defense Space & Security https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_Defense,_Space_%26_Secu... which consolidates

"Boeing Military Airplane Company; Hughes Satellite Systems; Hughes Helicopters minus the civilian helicopter line (which was divested as MD Helicopters); Piasecki Helicopter, subsequently known as Boeing Vertol and then Boeing Helicopters; the St. Louis–based McDonnell division of the former McDonnell Douglas Company; and the former North American Aviation division of Rockwell International."

making it not just too big to fail, but too important to US and allies' defense to fail. I guess defense could be split from commercial aviation which could be reduced to producing parts to keep fleets in operation until Airbus can replace all planes over 30 or 40 years. Some of McD-D's commercial planes have a second life as military, though, e.g. the P-8 Poseidon based on the 737-800.

I took a couple of cross-USA flights recently, some on 737-800 and some on 737 MAX 8 and noted that the 800's cruising speed is faster (cf. United's Hemispheres magazine). I suppose the carbon footprint of the MAX is lower, but whatever happened to flying at mach 0.9 ?

[jrockway]

> whatever happened to flying at mach 0.9

Someone made a website showing which airlines have the most delays, so airlines just added an hour of padding to every scheduled flight, and then fly slower / burn less fuel when there aren't delays. We do the same thing with commuter trains. Someone was mad that they were late to work one day during a snowstorm or something. Now trains with a top speed of 80mph take 80 minutes to go 40 miles. But are on time 99% of the time! Look at all the time saved from not being late to work!

Personally, I'd rather be 4 hours late to work once a year and save 1 hour commuting every day. But the masses have spoken and decided the opposite. I work from home, so not my problem, I guess.

[groby_b]

Meanwhile, Japan operates trains at 200mph and operators apologize profusely should they actually experience a 25 second delay.

Maybe the issue isn't that people complain about shitty service, but the fact that the service is shitty in the first place. At 80mph and at 30mph.

[syntheticnature]

Less about carbon footprint and more about fuel costs, IIRC; passengers are generally more cost-sensitive than time-sensitive, so if a plane can only hit mach 0.8 (or even worse) but has better fuel economy at the relevant speeds, that's better for the airline.

[Denvercoder9]

> whatever happened to flying at mach 0.9

Airlines found out that people, in aggregate, care more about ticket prices than about speed. Flying a bit slower allows planes to be more fuel efficient, and thus allows them to offer lower ticket prices.

[paledot]

*higher profits on the same ticket prices

[MilStdJunkie]

I wouldn't be horribly surprised by a Boeing breakup, honestly. Even BDS might splinter down into smaller units.

The real question in a Boeing breakup, IMHO, would be what happens with BGS, because the org as a whole does an insane amount of hide-the-salami with repair/return/rebuild.

[worik]

In a sane world it would be nationalised

In this world, and that country, it won't happen, and if it did it would be a cure worse than the disease