The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has given permission for the Boeing 737 MAX to fly again after being grounded for almost two years.
The top-selling planes were grounded in March 2019 after two deadly crashes barely five months apart claimed a total of 346 lives.
Regulators around the world grounded the Max in March 2019, after the crash of an Ethiopian Airlines jet. Only five months before, another Max flown by Indonesia´s Lion Air plunged into the Java Sea.
A total of 346 passengers and crew members on both planes were killed.
Both disasters were due to a flaw in a safety system designed to prevent the nose of the plane from pitching up during flight.
Boeing must make software upgrades and training changes to resume commercial flights, but several U.S. carriers have already indicated they’ll resume using the 737 MAX, including United and American Airlines.
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The FAA has given the greenlight for the Boeing 737 MAX to resume use in the United States. Families of those killed say the agency ‘is more concerned with saving Boeing’s investment’ than with safety
An upgrade of a jet first introduced in the 1960s, the 737 MAX was rolled out in 2017 and is Boeing’s top-selling jet.
The jet was grounded globally in the spring of 2019 after the October 29, 2018 crash of a Lion Air 737 MAX in Indonesia that killed 189 was soon followed by the March 10, 2019, crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 MAX that killed 157.
The back-to-back disasters sparked federal investigations not only into Boeing, but into failures in FAA oversight and certification.
Federal Aviation Administration chief Stephen Dickson signed an order Wednesday rescinding the grounding. U.S. airlines will be able to fly the Max once Boeing updates critical software and computers on each plane and pilots receive training in flight simulators.
Dickson, who took over in August 2019, said he felt ‘100% confident’ in the 737 MAX.
Wreckage of the Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 MAX crash from March 2019. The disaster, coupled with the crash of a Lion Air 737 Max months earlier, led aviation agencies worldwide to ground the jet for 20 months
Pilot training and software upgrades will focus on an system intended to prevent the 737 MAX from pitching upward during flight. In both disasters, the system shoving down the jet’s nose as pilots struggled to regain control
‘We’ve done everything humanly possible to make sure’ these types of crashes do not happen again, Dickson told Reuters, adding that design changes to the jet ‘have eliminated what caused these particular accidents.’
American is the only U.S. airline to put the Max back in its schedule so far, starting with one round trip daily between New York and Miami from December 29.
New pilot training and software upgrades will focus on the plane’s Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), which is intended to counter a tendency for the nose of the 737 MAX to rise up.
In both disasters, the software pushed the nose down repeatedly on both planes that crashed, overcoming the pilots’ struggles to regain control.
In each case, a single faulty sensor triggered the nose-down pitch.
When the 737 MAX does return to the skies, Boeing will be running a 24-hour war room to monitor flights, Reuters reported.
On CNBC Wednesday, Dickson said the design and pilot training changes required by the FAA ‘makes it impossible for the airplanes to have the same kind of accident that unfortunately killed 346 people’.
The agency also plans in-person inspections of hundreds of jets built during the ban, slowing their distribution by months, if not years.
Grounded Boeing 737 MAX aircraft are seen parked at Grant County International Airport in Moses Lake, Washington, in November
When the 737 MAX does return to the skies, Boeing will be running a 24-hour war room to monitor flights. The agency also plans in-person inspections of hundreds of jets built during the ban, slowing their distribution by months, if not years
‘These events and the lessons we have learned as a result have reshaped our company and further focused our attention on our core values of safety, quality and integrity,’ Boeing CEO David Calhoun said in a statement.
‘We have implemented a series of meaningful changes to strengthen the safety practices and culture of our company,’ he shared with employees in a letter.
Boeing’s tarnished reputation, coupled with the ongoing pandemic, led many buyers to cancel their orders of the 737 MAX.
At one point during the grounding, there were so many unclaimed planes that the jets were just parked in an employee parking lot at a Boeing factory in Washington state, next to workers’ sedans and minivans.
American Airlines said it will resume using the 737 MAX in December, with United following in the first quarter of 2021 and Southwest Airlines in the second quarter.
The EU gave the thumbs up to the 737 MAX in October, but Boeing must still receive approval from regulators in Brazil, China, and elsewhere.
Dickson said he expects international officials will ‘complete their work within a relatively short period of time.’
Shares in both Boeing and major U.S. airlines went up on Wednesday, in anticipation of the announcement – shares rose 3.5% to $217.38 in early trading
Loved ones of passengers on both crashes, some of whom are suing Boeing, have criticized the decision to resume using the 737 MAX.
In a letter, families of those killed in the Ethiopian Airlines crash said they felt ‘the FAA is more concerned with saving Boeing’s investment in the 737 MAX than it is on ensuring that the airplane is safe.’
The flying public should avoid the Max,’ said Michael Stumo, whose 24-year-old daughter died in the second crash.
‘Change your flight. This is still a more dangerous aircraft than other modern planes.’
Boeing’s reputation has taken a beating since the crashes. Its then-CEO, Dennis Muilenburg, initially suggested that the foreign pilots were to blame.
However, congressional investigators discovered an FAA analysis – conducted after the first Max crash – that predicted there would be 15 more crashes during the plane’s life span if the flight-control software were not fixed.
Boeing 737 Max 8 aircraft parked at Boeing Field in Seattle. American Airlines said it will resume using the jets in December, with United following in the first quarter of 2021
Relatives at the scene where the Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 Max 8 plane crashed shortly after takeoff, killing all 157 on board. Loved ones of passengers on both crashes, some of whom are suing Boeing, have criticized the decision to resume using the 737 MAX
After an 18-month investigation, the House Transportation Committee heaped blame on Boeing, which was under pressure to develop the Max to compete with a plane from European rival Airbus, and the FAA, which certified the Max and was the last agency in the world to ground it after the crashes. The investigators said Boeing suffered from a ‘culture of concealment,’ and pressured engineers to rush the plane to the market.
Boeing was repeatedly wrong about how quickly it could fix the plane. When those predictions continued to be wrong, and Boeing was perceived as putting undue pressure on the FAA, Muilenburg was fired in December 2019.
Dickson – a former Air Force and Delta Air Lines pilot – flew the plane personally before it was cleared.
A monument for the victims of the Ethiopian Airlines Flight ET302 Boeing 737 MAX plane crash is seen during a memorial ceremony at the French Embassy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Europe’s aviation regulator, the European Union Aviation Safety Agency, said it will take public comment on plans to clear the Max for flight and expects to finalize a plan by early next year. Some EU states will have to lift their own grounding notices as well. Regulators in Canada and China are still doing their own reviews.
Relatives say it’s too soon, and they and their lawyers say Boeing and the FAA are withholding documents. Anton Sahadi, who lives in Jakarta, Indonesia, and lost two brothers in the Lion Air crash, said it’s too early for the Max to fly again.
‘The cases from the incidents are not 100% finished yet,’ he said. ‘I think all the victims’ family in Indonesia and Ethiopia will feel the same, so regretful, why it can fly again because we are still in the recovery process for our problems because of the incidents.’
Naoise Ryan, an Irish citizen whose husband died in the Ethiopian crash, said the Max is ‘the same airplane that crashed not once but twice because safety was not a priority for this company.
