波音 737 Max 软件以 9 美元超低时薪外包给工程师

2018 年 10 月 29 日，印尼狮航波音 737 Max 8 客机在起飞 13 分钟后失联，随后被确认坠毁。133 天之后，2019 年 3 月10 日，埃塞俄比亚航空一架波音 737 Max 8 航班从亚的斯亚贝巴起飞，6 分钟后坠毁。两起事故无一人幸免。这两起波音事故暴露出波音 737 Max 客机的安全隐患。而近日，波音员工披露波音以 9 美元每小时的超低价格将 737 Max 软件相关工作外包给分包商。这些分包商是否有航空背景和相关资质？波音这么做究竟是出于什么目的？

# Boeing’s 737 Max software outsourced to $9-an-hour engineers

It remains the mystery at the heart of Boeing Co.’s 737 Max crisis: how a company renowned for meticulous design made seemingly basic software mistakes leading to a pair of deadly crashes. Longtime Boeing engineers say the effort was complicated by a push to outsource work to lower-paid contractors.

波音 737 危机的成因中依旧存在一个谜：这样一个以精密设计闻名世界的公司怎么会犯看似如此基础的软件错误，导致了两起致命坠机事故。波音的资深（软件）工程师表示，波音力图将工作外包给报酬更低的分包商 ，此举使设计过程复杂化。

The Max software — plagued by issues that could keep the planes grounded months longer after U.S. regulators this week revealed a new flaw — was developed at a time Boeing was laying off experienced engineers and pressing suppliers to cut costs.

本周，美国监管者披露了一个新发现的 Max 软件瑕疵。这使 Max 软件面临一系列相关安全问题，并可能会使波音飞机继续停飞数月。波音 Max 软件开发期间，波音辞退了一些资深工程师，并不断向供应商施压，以降低成本。

Increasingly, the iconic American planemaker and its subcontractors have relied on temporary workers making as little as $9 an hour to develop and test software, often from countries lacking a deep background in aerospace — notably India.

美国标志性飞机制造商波音和其承包商越来越依赖他们仅九美元一小时的临时工来开发和测试软件。这些临时工通常来自没有深厚航天背景的国家——尤其是印度。

In offices across from Seattle’s Boeing Field, recent college graduates employed by the Indian software developer HCL Technologies Ltd. occupied several rows of desks, said Mark Rabin, a former Boeing software engineer who worked in a flight-test group that supported the Max.

马克·拉宾是前波音软件工程师，他曾在波音 737 Max 机型软件的试飞支持小组工作。他表示，在西雅图波音机场对面的办公室里，有很多受雇于印度软件开发商 HCL 科技有限公司的员工都刚大学毕业不久，足足占了好几排工位。

The coders from HCL were typically designing to specifications set by Boeing. Still, “it was controversial because it was far less efficient than Boeing engineers just writing the code,” Rabin said. Frequently, he recalled, “it took many rounds going back and forth because the code was not done correctly.”

HCL 公司的编码员基本上是依照波音的详细设计说明来编写代码。但是，拉宾表示：“这么做依旧极具争议性，因为这要比波音工程师自己编码效率低得多。”很多情况下，拉宾回忆道：“要来来回回修改好几次，因为编码经常出错。”