Chapter 93: The Savior of the Boeing Empire
"Boeing 777, wow, I've thought of many ways Boeing could decline, but never thought it would be like this." At this point, Li Rongxian almost laughed.
The passenger aircraft market has great inertia. If you fail to keep up with market changes at a certain stage, it is easy to fall behind step by step. For example, the Boeing 737 series is benchmarked against the Airbus 320 series, and the Boeing 767 is benchmarked against the Airbus 330. As for the benchmark model of the queen of the skies, the Boeing 747, it has not yet appeared, that is, the Airbus 380 will be launched in a few years.
In the short- and medium-haul passenger aircraft market, the Boeing 737 and the Airbus 320 are fighting tooth and nail. In the jumbo jet market, the Boeing 747 has no rivals, but in the middle range, the Boeing 767, which was once highly anticipated, has been overwhelmed by the Airbus 330.
In line with the principle of not giving up an inch of land, Boeing naturally had to launch a corresponding model that could compete with the Airbus 330. The Boeing 777 came into being, but now the problems of the Boeing 777 have begun to seriously affect Boeing's overall layout.
The huge investment in Boeing 777 has put Boeing in a dilemma. Should it continue to increase investment to ensure the smooth production of Boeing 777, or should it make a drastic decision and directly skip Boeing 777 and instead invest financial and material resources into the newer 7E7 project?
However, there are two difficult problems with the latter. If the Boeing 777 is skipped, the investment of nearly six years will basically go down the drain, which is a serious blow even for a giant company like Boeing. In addition, the 7E7 project is still only in the planning stage. Even if a large amount of money is invested and it enters the substantial promotion stage, it is still far from commercial use. At this stage, the Airbus 330 and the less popular Airbus 340 will be very popular. Boeing can't put its hopes on the old Boeing 767.
In addition, the direction of the passenger aircraft market is not static. The development of the Boeing 777 and 7E7 took more than ten years. Who knows whether there will still be a place for medium and long-range passenger aircraft in the world passenger aircraft market after the official commercial model of the 7E7 is launched?
If it’s gone, Boeing will be in a huge crisis!
From Airbus's perspective, this is a great gift from God.
Seeing that Li Rongcheng didn't say anything, Li Rongxian shrugged and didn't continue to ask about the 7E7. Anyway, no matter how he tried, he couldn't get anything out of Li Rongcheng. It's not that Li Rongcheng's mouth is so tight, but even Boeing's top executives probably don't know much about the 7E7, after all, it's just a hypothetical model.
Li Rongxian mentioned 7E7 just to disgust his half-brother. After all, the opportunity to disgust Boeing is very rare.
Looking at Li Rongcheng's expression as if he had eaten a fly, Li Rongxian felt that all the pores in his body opened up. How comfortable it was!
Li Rongxian stretched his body and started to speak in a sarcastic tone again: "Although our relationship is not so-so, we are brothers after all. Let me tell you something. EASA is not FAA. If Boeing 777 wants to obtain the joint airworthiness certificate, it cannot just do one or two years of routine operation verification. EASA is likely to conduct special situation simulation verification, so you should be prepared. However, Boeing should have received the news as well. It is really exciting to see what tricks EASA will come up with."
At the end, Li Rongxian couldn't hold it in anymore and burst into laughter.
The civil aviation authorities in various places will definitely take care of local aircraft research and development companies, just like the FAA to Boeing and EASA to Airbus.
If there was a problem with the Boeing 777 when it was applying for the joint airworthiness certificate from EASA, why would Boeing be given an extra chance like the FAA did?
Of course, it cannot be said that the failure of the Boeing 777 in the FAA verification flight has no impact on EASA. At least after receiving the news, EASA's safety committee has firmly remembered the Boeing 777 model and has an extremely bad innate impression of it. Subsequent review activities will be more stringent.
In fact, everything can be figured out, just like the inspection of pilots. If the inspector has a bad impression of him, he will find faults in everything, which will make anyone feel uncomfortable.
Although Li Rongxian seemed to be kind enough to reveal some inside information to Li Rongcheng, how could Li Rongcheng not know it? Li Rongxian just wanted to see Li Rongcheng in pain.
"Okay, no more talking." Li Rongxian was comfortable enough, so he couldn't push it any further. If Li Rongcheng got so angry that he lost his mind, it would be bad for everyone. He took a sip of wine and asked casually, "I have something strange. Why did you come to Jianchuan? What's interesting here? Shouldn't you be busy looking for the pilot who can put out the fire?"
Li Rongcheng was also able to keep his composure. He did not lose his temper despite being ridiculed by his younger brother . He snorted, "I don't need to report to you where and when I go."
After saying that, Li Rongcheng wiped his mouth lightly, then stood up and left, leaving behind Li Rongxian with a gloomy face.
"What a troublesome guy." Li Rongxian threw the fork heavily on the plate, making a loud noise and attracting the attention of people around him.
Although Li Rongxian had been the active party in the conversation just now, and he was full of sarcasm, it actually had no practical significance. Li Rongxian was not the kind of person who indulged in personal emotional venting. What he really wanted was to anger Li Rongcheng in the early stage and make him less cautious due to his lack of rationality. The last question was his purpose.
Frankly speaking, although the entire Boeing empire is now prosperous, it is only one pilot away from the decline of the empire. It may be easier to deal with the FAA, but it is not easy to fool EASA. With only the FAA's airworthiness certificate and no EASA's joint airworthiness certificate, the Boeing 777 is still a failed model.
Moreover, after EASA made it clear that it would conduct more stringent verification, Boeing could only hope for a savior, an omnipotent pilot who could handle all flight failures, as it could not make significant upgrades to the 777 in the short term.
Li Rongcheng should be trying to find such a pilot at this moment, but why did he come to such a small place like Jianchuan at this critical moment?
To be honest, Li Rongcheng should be at the headquarters of Muhua Airlines, Tiannan Airlines and Guoda Airlines at this moment, because that is where excellent pilots gather. What does Jianchuan City have? Some small airlines with mixed capital? Branch bases of the three major airlines? It is clearly an insignificant place.
If it weren't for the fact that Blue Sky Airlines happened to have an order for Airbus 321 and Li Rongxian happened to be in the country, it would have been the first time he heard of the city of Jianchuan.
Boeing and Airbus have been fighting each other for nearly 20 years. Unexpectedly, Boeing's fortunes for the next decade depend on a single pilot.
After drinking the rest of the wine, Li Rongxian was silent for a while. Looking at the mobile phone on the table, he hesitated, picked up the phone and made a call.
As the call was connected, Ma Cheng's voice came from the other end: "Mr. Li, I didn't expect you would still call me."
"Mr. Ma, you have been very close to my eldest brother in the past two days." Li Rongxian chuckled.
"Oh, they are all personal friends."
Li Rongxian slowly smiled: "If I want to ask why my elder brother came to Jianchuan, would you mind telling me, Mr. Ma?"
The other party obviously paused for a long time, and finally just responded with an awkward smile: "Mr. Li, this is a private matter, I can't say anything."
Li Rongxian certainly knew that Ma Cheng and Li Rongcheng had a good personal relationship, and he didn't expect to get an answer just by asking. This kind of thing would definitely come at a price.
"Mr. Ma, let's not talk about those twists and turns. You should have heard about the 777 incident. In the future, the 330 will dominate the mid-to-long-range wide-body aircraft market. You should understand what I mean." Li Rongxian's expression gradually became indifferent.
Before, if Li Rongxian had spoken to Ma Cheng like this, Ma Cheng would not have stayed for a moment and would have hung up the phone directly. But now, the world is changing, and we can't act on impulse like this.
What Li Rongxian said was not a lie; it was really going to happen.
After waiting for a while, Ma Cheng finally said, "Mr. Li and I are good friends..."
However, before Ma Cheng could finish his words, Li Rongxian said directly: "For the next 330 order, there will be an extra 5% discount!"
After this blow, Ma Cheng fell silent. After more than ten seconds, he said, "Boss Li, you're making it very difficult for me to do this."
At this point, Ma Cheng changed the subject: "Mr. Li came to Jianchuan this time..."
…
The fact was just as Wang Xuan said. When the personnel from the bureau interviewed Xu Cang and Tan Heling, they did not show any aggressive attitude of asking questions to get to the bottom of things. The whole atmosphere seemed relatively harmonious.
Because afterward, the flight data showed that when Blue Sky 9211 was in an abnormal dive due to the airflow, the maximum wind speed of the downdraft was close to 90 meters per second, which was terrifying. Such violent airflow was beyond the control of the aircraft and could not be controlled by the pilot.
As for the subsequent power system failure, the bureau also expressed great understanding. A total of 63 lightning strikes were found on the fuselage of aircraft 9211, and these were only the ones with excessive damage. There were countless lightning strikes that did not exceed the standard.
When technicians inspected the aircraft circuits of Flight 9211, they found that a large number of them had been burned out. The damage was quite serious and could not be recovered by the pilot.
As for the engine stalling in heavy rain, the bureau has no clear theoretical support. However, Xichang City, which is below the airspace where the incident occurred, experienced the heaviest rainfall in nearly 60 years, which shows how terrible the rainfall was in the area where 9211 was located at that time.
All signs indicate that this incident was caused by objective weather conditions. Of course, this does not mean that the crew had no problems, or to be more precise, Blue Sky Airlines was responsible for this incident, that is, the regulations on flying around thunderstorms were not strict enough.
However, the authority has shown a certain degree of tolerance for this matter, because it is not just Blue Sky Airlines that has unclear regulations on flying around thunderstorms. If you look closely, almost all airlines have unclear expressions or implementations of the relevant regulations.
Compared with the issue of finding the crew members, the bureau staff preferred to discuss with Xu Cang and Tan Heling their ideas in handling related special situations.
Because many of the bureau's personnel also have a flying background, once they encounter such a situation, they like to put themselves in the corresponding scenario and think about what they should do. However, when they learned about the handling ideas of the Blue Sky 9211 crew, based on their own flying background, they couldn't help but feel a little surprised, and they started to share their experiences.
In that era, flight management was indeed becoming more and more scientific, but slightly older pilots actually believed in experience more. They never thought that Boeing's manual could handle all faults, of course, Boeing itself thought so.
If the manual can solve all problems, then is there any difference between good and bad pilots? Just memorize the manual!
For this kind of experience-based work, even the staff of the bureau should absorb other people's "problem-solving" ideas to enrich themselves. If they encounter similar situations in the future, it may be a life-saving thing.
Looking at the publicity materials that came later is simply not able to restore the situation at that time. Only by communicating with the eyewitnesses and those who handled the situation can one understand the situation at that time.
In this state of mind, what was originally a meeting with the authority turned into an exchange meeting on flying experience.
Who is Xu Cang? As the future chief pilot of the Civil Aviation Administration of China, his insights on flying are profound. Even some of the most experienced personnel in the bureau feel enlightened after hearing what Xu Cang has to say.
Moreover, Xu Cang was reborn with the experience of the golden decade of domestic civil aviation. To be honest, now is the wild era of domestic civil aviation, with all kinds of irregularities or loopholes in regulations. Even Xu Cang's slight disclosure of advanced management experience can make the bureau staff feel like they have found a treasure.
During the interview, the bureau personnel were accompanied by the company's safety and supervision department. Although Jin Fuli was an Airbus model person, he worked part-time in the safety and supervision department. He was also quite experienced and knew some of the bureau personnel, so he was sent by the company to help out.
As a result, Jin Fuli was so fascinated by Xu Cang's talk that he was like a primary school student. In the end, when he came to his senses, he felt regretful again. Why didn't he discover Xu Cang, such a genius, earlier?
Not to mention Jin Fuli, everyone in the bureau was stunned by Xu Cang's eloquent words, so that basically no one asked questions and everyone just listened to Xu Cang talking.
When it comes to traditional navigation without any equipment support, the people in the bureau prick up their ears and listen. Nowadays, many pilots have almost forgotten the traditional navigation method under visual rules because they have been operating under instrument flight rules for too long.
Not to mention traditional navigation that relies on visual conditions, even if it does not rely on integrated electronic displays, some young pilots may not be able to read the old-fashioned mechanical instruments.
Such deficiencies still need more experience accumulation. Xu Cang's brilliant performance in traditional navigation in the 9211 incident was the core of the special situation handling. At this stage began to gradually ask Xu Cang questions, and Xu Cang answered them fluently. Even in the later stage, Xu Cang began to jump out of the mistakes of the bureau staff in the questions.
Normally, pilots would be trembling with fear when they were interviewed by the authorities, but this time it was Xu Cang who was in charge of everything. Jin Fuli began to envy him again.
Suddenly, in the midst of the increasingly heated discussion, Jin Fuli's cell phone rang, which disrupted the atmosphere and rhythm, and made many bureau staff somewhat dissatisfied.
Jin Fuli knew that he was being rude and wanted to hang up the phone, but when he looked at the number, it seemed to be from the fleet. He thought that it would be bad to hang up if something really happened, so he had to smile and go out to answer the phone.
When I answered the phone, I found out that it was a representative from Airbus who suddenly came over to discuss the order intention of Blue Sky Airlines for five Airbus 321s that Airbus had previously placed with Airbus.
A company of Blue Sky's size certainly cannot buy dozens of planes like the Big Three airlines do. Buying five planes at once is considered a big order. However, in terms of price, there is little room for discussion about Blue Sky. This is because retail investors like Blue Sky do not have a high status in Airbus's mind. They can buy or not, so it is naturally a seller's market.
However, buying an airplane is not like buying vegetables. You cannot just buy it when you think about it. Instead, you submit your intention to purchase, and then representatives of both parties discuss the details before making a decision.
Normally, such a small order would not require Airbus headquarters to send any senior leaders. But this time, the Airbus representative who suddenly showed up was very high-ranking, so high that the flight department leaders were a little overwhelmed and could only ask an old man like Jin Fuli to calm the situation.
Although Jin Fuli's administrative level was not high, it was Jin Fuli who made the final decision on the introduction of the first batch of Airbus aircraft to Blue Sky Airlines at the Airbus headquarters. Therefore, the leaders of the flight department thought that Jin Fuli could handle such a situation.
Jin Fuli actually didn't want to get involved in these trivial matters. Even if he was good at calming down the situation, he still had to put on a smile in such occasions. He didn't want to do that as he was not a coward.
But after repeated requests from the fleet staff, Jin Fuli finally agreed. If he refused, he even felt that the person who called was about to cry.
After tidying up his clothes, Jin Fuli went upstairs to the fleet office. Before he arrived, he heard a noisy movement from afar, and then saw a lot of people gathered at the entrance of the fleet office, including many leaders of the flight department and some leaders of the marketing department.
These leaders all had fake smiles on their faces and surrounded a tall young man, who was Li Rongxian, the head of Airbus in the Asia-Pacific region.
After receiving the news from Ma Cheng, Li Rongxian went directly to the Blue Sky Aviation Base without stopping at all.
All the leaders breathed a sigh of relief when they suddenly saw Jin Fuli coming. In front of this young man, they were completely led by the young man, and it was obvious that they could not control the situation.
Jin Fuli is a careless person. He doesn't care about the Airbus leaders. Aren't they all just a pair of eyes and two ears?
When he got closer, Jin Fuli was slightly surprised to see Li Rongxian's face with some oriental colors, but he didn't show it too much. In this day and age, mixed-race people are not uncommon.
With Jin Fuli's arrival, many leaders present fell silent. Li Rongxian naturally noticed this change in the atmosphere, and he immediately understood that Jin Fuli was the boss, so he smiled and extended his hand: "Hello, I'm Li Rongxian, head of Airbus Asia Pacific."
Jin Fuli raised his eyebrows. Although he was not a senior manager of the headquarters, being the head of a region should not be underestimated. No wonder these young leaders were inferior in momentum.
Jin Fuli's expression remained unchanged. He stretched out his hand and shook hands with Li Rongxian: "Jin Fuli!"
Unlike the timid leaders around him, Jin Fuli looked neither humble nor arrogant, which made Li Rongxian look up to him.
Releasing his hand, Li Rongxian smiled and said, "I didn't come here to discuss the deal, but I happened to be on my way, so I was sent here by the headquarters. I hope my sudden visit didn't cause any trouble to your company, did I?"
"No no!"
Before Jin Fuli could speak, the leaders around him began to deny it with a little panic.
Jin Fuli's face gradually darkened. Usually these leaders were arrogant to their subordinates, but they were servile to a foreigner. The difference was extremely obvious, and he couldn't stand it.
Although Li Rongxian has a high rank, he actually has little influence on the interests of Blue Sky Airlines, because Airbus has hardly given Blue Sky Airlines any discounts, and Blue Sky Airlines is also self-aware and has never had any illusions about this.
Since it is a fair deal, then we can just treat Li Rongxian normally. Is it necessary to serve him like this? Or if we serve Li Rongxian well, Airbus will give us a discount, which is impossible.
Jin Fuli couldn't stand the flattery from his leaders anymore, so he interrupted them: "If you want to discuss the order, please go to my office. It's not convenient to talk here."
Li Rongxian smiled slightly and said, "Thank you, Mr. Jin, for leading the way."
Jin Fuli nodded and went to his office without even waiting for Li Rongxian. Li Rongxian was not annoyed and quickly followed him. The two walked side by side, while some leaders followed him and some returned to their posts.
Jin Fuli and the other man were walking in front, and suddenly Li Rongxian said, "Mr. Jin, I came here to discuss the order, but I have another thing to do."
"Hmm?" Jin Fuli raised his eyebrows, a hint of surprise flashed across his face: "Anything else?"
He couldn't understand what else the Airbus representatives could talk about besides orders. Would they talk about their life ideals?
"It's like this." Li Rongxian lowered his voice and said, "When I came here, I heard that your company has a talented pilot. Can I introduce him to him?"
Jin Fuli was startled: "Who is it?"
A gleam of light flashed in Li Rongxian's eyes: "Xu Cang!"
