Jedi mind-tricking regulators on simulator training
Boeing Regulatory Compliance — FAA certification filing, FAA Joint Aircraft Operations Group Submission
“The Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) operates transparently to the crew and preserves existing 737 handling qualities without requiring simulator differences training.”
Mark Forkner — 737 Chief Technical Pilot, Internal Email to Colleague
“I'll be jedi mind-tricking regulators into accepting the training... probably save Boeing a few hundred million dollars.”
The Split:The certification filings presented MCAS as benignly transparent to pilots. Internally, the chief technical pilot celebrated using 'jedi mind-tricks' on safety regulators to avoid mandatory simulator sessions and preserve a multi-million-dollar airline rebate clause.
Whenever a complex software override is claimed to be 'transparent to the operator', ask whether it was hidden to avoid retraining costs.