Relatives of those killed in Boeing crashes protest
FAMILIES of the passengers who died in one of the Boeing 737 Max crashes have lobbied Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao to slow what they consider a rush to let the plane fly again.
Two of the relatives who took part in the two-hour meeting in Washington said Chao promised that the government will take as long as necessary to ensure that the plane is safe but stopped short of agreeing to an entirely new, top-to- bottom review.
A spokesman for Chao said the department and the Federal Aviation Administration had taken unprecedented steps to understand the accidents and the FAA’s certification of the plane in 2017. One of those steps, he said, included Chao’s appointment of a special committee to review the FAA’s process of certifying planes.
After the meeting, several dozen relatives held a vigil on the steps of the Transportation Department headquarters to mark the six-month anniversary of the crash of Ethiopian Airlines flight 302.
They carried pictures of many of the 157 people who died. Another 189 died in the October 2018 crash of a Max jet operated by Indonesia’s Lion Air.
Separately, Boeing disclosed this week that it delivered just 18 airliners in August, putting the company on pace for its worst showing since 2013. With Max deliveries halted since March, Boeing gave customers 276 planes through August, down from 481 in the same period last year.
Chicago-based Boeing has said it expects FAA approval for the Max to fly again early in the fourth quarter. US airlines don’t expect to use the plane until at least December, and the wait could be longer in other countries because of signs that international regulators will take a slower approach than FAA.
A group of 11 family members asked Chao to direct the FAA to conduct a completely new review of the Max instead of mainly examining changes Boeing made to flight-control software called MCAS, which was implicated in both crashes. FAA is part of her department.
Chao did not commit to full re-certification but said the FAA would wait for recommendations from a technical review board before it let the plane fly, according to a department spokesman. The department is also being advised by a review panel that includes international regulators and by the special committee that Chao appointed, but the FAA won’t wait for those reports before deciding whether to approve the Max for flight, the spokesman said.
Michael Stumo, whose daughter Samya died in the Ethiopian crash, said those panels and foreign regulators “can go far beyond just reviewing MCAS. Time will tell, but we were encouraged by the meeting.”
European officials have said they will insist on test flights during extreme manoeuvres – both with Boeing’s software and with MCAS turned off – to judge the stability of the plane.
Terry McCrann is on leave and will return in October.