| The global panic over the safety of Boeing’s premier commercial airliner has reached the White House.
In a phone call on Tuesday, Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg sought to assure President Trump of the safety of the Boeing 737 Max 8, as pressure mounts on the administration and the company to ground the plane until an international investigation is complete.
Lawmakers, industry groups and foreign officials are demanding answers after a Boeing 737 Max 8 crashed in Ethiopia over the weekend, killing all 157 people on board. In October, the same model jet crashed in Indonesia, killing 189 people.
Boeing said it would update its flight control systems to comply with an advisory from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) mandating specific “design changes” by next month (Chicago Tribune).
But the FAA is taking no further action at this point.
“Thus far, our review shows no systemic performance issues and provides no basis to order grounding the aircraft. …If any issues affecting the continued airworthiness of the aircraft are identified, the FAA will take immediate and appropriate action.” — FAA airworthiness notification authorizing continued flights of the Boeing 737 Max 8 fleet
The president, who has boasted about a decline in domestic aviation disasters under his watch, tweeted on Tuesday that airplanes have become “too complex to fly.”
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the administration would allow the investigation to play out before taking action.
“We have to review and see what actually took place. We know that a lot of people in the industry have started to voice concerns about the amount of technology and taking the power out of the hands of the pilots, you saw the president talk about that in his tweets earlier today. This is going to be a process and we’re going to be in constant contact through the Department of Transportation, the FAA and make a determination at the appropriate time.”— Sanders
More than 40 countries — but not the United States — have banned Boeing 737 Max 8 flights after the crash in Ethiopia.
Sens. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) are among those demanding action.
Some aviation experts believe the data recorders recovered from the crash site could provide strong early indicators about what went wrong during the fatal flight. The investigative team in Ethiopia announced today that the black boxes will be sent out of the country for analysis, but has not said where (Reuters).
More analysis on Boeing controversy:
The New York Times graphic: Southwest Airlines is flying 34 Boeing 737 Max 8 jets as of Tuesday, while American Airlines is flying 24. The FAA says there are 74 Boeing 737 Max 8 jets in U.S. fleets. At least two pilots raised concerns about the planes before the latest crash.
The New York Times: Questions about the Boeing 737 Max 8 arose following a Lion Air crash in Indonesia in October. Safety on modern jetliners is affected by fierce industry competition, technological advances and pilot training. To compensate for larger engines on the 737 Max, Boeing added a computerized system, called a maneuvering characteristics augmentation system, to prevent the plane’s nose from getting too high and causing a stall. Faulty sensor data may have instead caused the system to keep pushing the nose down, possibly leading to the Lion Air disaster.
The Associated Press: Information void leads many to take action.
The Wall Street Journal: Boeing 737 Max the latest example of a passive Transportation Department.
Reuters: Boeing needs to think faster than its watchdog.
CNBC: Boeing stock shares tumble.
BBC: Timeline of air disasters. |
