Boeing 737 Max. FAA predicted fatal 737 Max crashes but allowed it to keep flying before 2nd crash Boeing 737 Max. FAA predicted fatal 737 Max crashes but allowed it to keep flying before 2nd crash
FAA predicted fatal risks in 737 Max but allowed it to keep flying before second crash, document shows.
The December 2018 document was released during a US House hearing on the 737 Max certification.
FAA personnel predicted 15 more crashes over the course of the 737 Max assuming no software changes were made.
The Federal Aviation Administration predicted more fatal crashes of the Boeing 737 Max after a Lion Air flight went down in October 2018, an internal document released Wednesday showed, but the agency allowed the planes to keep flying until a second Max crashed earlier this year.
The FAA and other air safety regulators around the world didn’t ground the planes until a second crash, which occurred in March in Ethiopia, killing the 157 people on the flight. The first crash, less than five months earlier was a Lion Air 737 Max that went down shortly after takeoff in October 2018, killing all 189 people on board.
The internal FAA review, dated Dec. 3, 2018, said 15 fatal crashes of the 737 Max were possible if there were no changes made to flight-control software that was implicated in both crashes, over the course of the plane’s lifetime, which would last decades.
The FAA review was released during a hearing of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure on the agency’s approval of the 737 Max.
After the Lion Air crash in October 2018, the FAA issued an emergency directive to airlines flying the 737 Max, ordering them to spell out procedures to counter conditions like those that occurred on the Lion Air flight.
Boeing said in a statement that the FAA found the measures the manufacturer and agency took after Lion Air “sufficed to allow continued operation of the MAX fleet until changes to the ... software could be implemented.” The company added that Boeing’s risk analysis matched the FAA’s conclusions about the aircraft’s risks.
The planes remain grounded after a flight ban was implemented in March and the FAA has repeatedly said it has no firm timeline to allow the jets to fly again. Boeing has developed a software fix for the jets that makes it less aggressive to give pilots greater control. It also plans to install more redundancies.
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