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From the perspective of 23 years of experience maintaining aircraft: I will take a Boeing over an Airbus any day. Boeings are much more user-friendly for the mechanic. Whenever I have to make a "MX house-call" the last aircraft that my eyes want to see on that tarmac is an Airbus. The airframe, in general, is a nightmare to work around--too damn high off the deck, although the flightdeck is laid out superbly well. Everything is fly-by-wire now, and that is the most troubling aspect--no solid connections between the pilot and the flight controls. (Experience: B707, 727, 737, 747, 757, 767; Lockheed L1011; DC8, DC9, MD80; Airbus A300, A310, A320)

<< From the perspective of 23 years of experience maintaining aircraft: I will take a Boeing over an Airbus any day. Boeings are much more user-friendly for the mechanic. Whenever I have to make a "MX house-call" the last aircraft that my eyes want to see on that tarmac is an Airbus. The airframe, in general, is a nightmare to work around--too damn high off the deck, although the flightdeck is laid out superbly well. Everything is fly-by-wire now, and that is the most troubling aspect--no solid connections between the pilot and the flight controls. (Experience: B707, 727, 737, 747, 757, 767; Lockheed L1011; DC8, DC9, MD80; Airbus A300, A310, A320) >>

Well said.

With a time-span of 45 years since I was issued my Student Pilot Licence, 44 since my PPL, 43 years since Air Force ab initio, 42 since CPL, 40 since ATPL and an hour or two spent driving most of them, I'm with you.

Boeing is better by far and even a cursory look at the world's accident reports bears out that [1] Airbus "sells" airplanes too casually and to operators not worthy of that description and [2] Airbus's fly by wire systems have been the primary cause of way too many accidents and -- created to a "dumbest-common-denominator" [See [1] above] standard -- can prevent and have prevented Real Pilots [As opposed to most of today's low-bidder-in-pilot-costume arcade-gamer substitutes] from recovering from what should be only INCIPIENT-accident flight conditions.

Best ones -- Brian