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Comment by dageshi | Hacker News Reader

Genuine question, would anyone want to buy planes like this from a company that's small enough to fail?

I'm guessing not.

The idea is that if it's small enough to fail, then the incentives are much stronger to avoid failure. If it's too big to fail, why would they put effort into avoiding failure? So yes, buying from a small enough to fail company could be seen as safer.

Note that too big to fail, and small enough to fail has less to do with the size of the company and more to do with market position and government perception.

Playing devils advocate. I’m guessing long term maintenance would be a concern when ones buying something as expensive as a plane. How do you trust a new small company with this?

Yes, it would. But right now the long term maintenance of the A380 is shaky despite Airbus still being around. Devils advocate to long term maintenance with a large company: they could just stop caring about you as a customer or refuse to support you.

It's a difficult space to make decisions in and I think it's difficult to make any broad statements about reliability of product or company. Someone would need to actually run some numbers.

Maybe they'd put effort into avoiding failure if we held decision makers liable for negligence when appropriate, rather than shielding them with the entire company employing thousands.

I think the reverse of the question is also important: why would anyone want to fly on a plane made by such a colossal company that any blame for flaws (design/technical or decision process) is diluted to the point that hundreds of deaths result in no measurable punishment?

I don't disagree. My point I guess is, if you're buying a plane that will potentially be in service for many decades you need some kind of reassurance the manufacturer will still be around to support it?

Make a law that all designs of failed airline companies are open-sourced to their competitors, so that parts can still be produced.

I d be their competitor I d refuse to produce them and move to Mexico.

You generally don't have a choice - true you can see the type of plane when you book, but airlines swap them out all the time.

Besides, it's the regulatory environment and the reputation of the airline that provides most of the actual safety. Aircraft failures are in fact very rare. Even the 737 MAX is a profoundly safe aircraft compared to almost any car brand in terms of passenger miles, and usually by passenger minutes too.

There are dozens of small airplane manufacturers. Cessna nearly failed in the '90s, but they're doing fine today. They're still small enough to fail. Also there are bizjet manufacturers that could fail. Aircraft producers usually sell the right to own parts and service at a discount through chapter 11 work, so it's not like the parts and service aircraft need to keep flying vanish if the parent company fails. Usually.

Companies like Pipistrel that are producing innovative aircraft are usually small enough to fail.

Yeah I guess I wasn't really sure that would work with commercial airliners, given their probable lifespan/complexity. If the manufacturer goes out of business, who has the expertise to maintain the planes for the rest of their working life?

In the United States, aviation mechanics are trained primarily to be generalists who can safely operate on any aircraft. Airline regulation may create specializations. The manufacturer needs to provide parts and certain highly specialized services (like rebuilding damaged wings, for example.) That parts and service supply is wrapped up in a "Type Certification Ownership". That type ownership is a valuable thing, because it's a guaranteed population of customers. Therefore, when aviation companies fail, the type ownership is auctioned off, and it will be bought.

Bombardier's C-series was just starting to sell well among big carriers (Delta) before the US sabotaged them to protect Boeing, which brought them to their knees, forced them to sell everything off and they probably won't survive the pandemic, so yes.

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