CLIPPING ITS WINGS

A WORKER stands on a platform near a Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft being built for TUI Group at Boeing’s Renton Assembly Plant in Washington State. Boeing said on Friday that it plans to cut its monthly 737 aircraft production by nearly 20 percent in the wake of two deadly crashes, signalling it does not expect aviation authorities to allow the plane back in the air any time soon. Deliveries of Boeing’s best-selling aircraft were frozen after a global grounding of the narrow-body model following the crash of an Ethiopian Airlines jet on March 10, killing all 157 people on board. Production will be cut to 42 aircraft a month from 52 starting mid-April, the company said, without giving an end-date. US and airline officials said they now believe the plane could be grounded for at least two months, but an even longer grounding is a serious possibility. The crash in Ethiopia and the crash of a Lion Air plane in Indonesia last October that killed all 189 people on board have left the world’s largest plane maker in crisis. Chief executive Dennis Muilenburg said on Friday that the company now knows that a chain of events caused both disasters, with erroneous activation of so-called MCAS anti-stall software “a common link” between the two. Boeing said it would not reduce jobs at the new production rate and will work to minimise the financial impact. Boeing’s board will establish a committee to review how it designs and develops airplanes, Muilenburg said. | Reuters | AP Photo