Boeing’s Push to Make Training Profitable May Have Left 737 Max Pilots Unprepared

On an overcast Friday in January 2016, thousands of employees gathered outside the 737 jetliner factory in a Seattle suburb for the first flight of the Max, the newest version of Boeing Co.’s 50-year-old workhorse. Thousands more watched a live feed at their desks. Two of Boeing’s ace test pilots sat at the controls, one an ex-U.S. Air Force fighter jock, the other a Navy veteran who’d also flown experimental planes for NASA. As the pilots fired up the first engine, the hulking plane rolled forward several feet—they’d forgotten to set the parking brake.

Inside the fraternity of Boeing pilots, it was an eyebrow-raising moment that later, after the uneventful flight landed to cheers, led to some teasing of the crack duo, Ed Wilson and Craig Bomben, for missing one of the steps in the preflight checklist.