UPDATE 1-Boeing texts reveal flawed simulator, not smoking gun – ex-colleagues

Four days after leaked internal pilot messages set off a media firestorm for Boeing Co, former colleagues have defended a former pilot who voiced concerns about unreported 737 MAX software problems two years before fatal crashes. Chief Technical Pilot Mark Forkner described in the leaked messages how MCAS cockpit software, which has since been linked to crashes in Indonesia in 2018 and in Ethiopia in March this year, was “running rampant” during a flight simulator session. The messages fuelled speculation that either Boeing or Forkner or both knew about problems with the plane’s flight control software well before the two crashes which killed a total of 346 people, sending its shares sharply lower.