[nickjj]

Would grounding it really destroy their reputation? Grounding it doesn't mean indefinitely.

If anything, it's a huge positive if they grounded it until they knew for certain what's wrong because then it's a double win. Firstly, on the ground the plane has a 0% chance of killing anyone (unless someone decided to jump off the top of a parked plane and commit suicide, etc.), and secondly Boeing's reputation goes up because now people have a chance to think "ok finally, they actually care about safety instead of profits".

Also, Southwest is the largest US flyer of this plane and it only makes up about 5% of their fleet, so it's not like the entire world's flight traffic gets disrupted. Lastly, I would think most people who are scheduled to fly on one of these planes will cancel or demand a plane switch, so the delays and flight traffic issues are still going to happen to some degree.

Currently, all I'm reminded about from this situation is how insanely corrupt the US govt is (I'm from the US btw) and how little Southwest cares about people because they won't even let you cancel without paying out of pocket, which is totally insane. You only have 1 life.

[isostatic]

Had Boeing grounded the fleet in the hours following the second crash (we're confident there's no problem however due to the highly unlikely coincidence we are proactively taking this step out of an abundance of cation), sure. When the truth comes out they'd be respected regardless of the outcome.

Too late now though. If the truth comes out and it's not a Boeing problem, their reputation suffers for "what might have been". If it is, their reputation suffers for "profits over safety"

Southwest, for what it's worth, were offering free changes of ticket for those on a max. American weren't.

[nickjj]

At first I didn't agree with your "too late now" remark but now that the US grounded them, you were spot on.

Now it feels more like a calculated reaction based on profits (ie. enough people cancelled MAX flights or asked for a flight change that grounding the plane is now a better decision financially).

In any case, it's a good result that they are grounded until everyone knows what happened during the crash and have an iron clad solution to prevent the same thing from happening in the future.