May 23, 2025, (c) Leeham News: The US Department of Justice and Boeing okayed the framework of a Non-Prosecution Agreement to finally resolve the litigation dating to the 2018/19 737 MAX accidents and the Jan. 5, 2024, Alaska Airlines flight 1282 accident. The notice was filed today in the federal court of the Northern District of Texas.
Boeing agrees to pay a total of $1.1bn in fines, compensation and investments. Some of this was previously paid with a Deferred Prosecution Agreement reached in 2021; and some was agreed in a second DPA reached last December. The first DPA was essentially voided following the Flight 1282 accident and the second was rejected on procedural grounds by the judge in the Texas federal court.
The notice may be downloaded here: NPA Notice 5-23-25.
The full agreement should be filed next week, the DOJ said.
By Scott Hamilton
Dec. 27, 2022, © Leeham News: The US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) today issued a critique of the newly released final investigation report of the Ethiopian government of the March 10, 2019, crash of a Boeing 737 MAX.
Ethiopian Airlines flight ET302 came five months after Lion Air flight JT610, a MAX, crashed. Both accidents began when the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) activated following a failure of the single Angle of Attack (AOA) sensor to which it was tied malfunctioned (JT610) or failed (ET302).
Boeing issued a notice to MAX operators after the Lion Air crash outlining proper procedures pilots should follow in case MCAS erroneously activated again. The Ethiopian government investigation placed the blame for the crash on Boeing. The NTSB’s critique concluded the pilots failed to follow Boeing recommendations and should be partly held responsible for the probable cause of the crash. Had they followed procedure, the NTSB concludes the pilots could have successfully flown through the emergency.
November 27, 2020, ©. Leeham News: After the lifting on the grounding order by the FAA, ANAC (Brazils regulator) followed in the week, and EASA issued its plans for public comment.
What are the differences in the ungrounding conditions, and what are the reasons for any differences?
By Bjorn Fehrm
November 24, 2020, ©. Leeham News: Last week, we went through the core MCAS changes the FAA demanded from Boeing to lift the grounding of the 737 MAX 8 and 9. As the investigation into the MAX crashes deepened, changes were added beyond the core MCAS related changes.
A single sensor failure, like the Angle of Attack failures for Lion Air JT610 and Ethiopian Airlines ET302, triggered a multitude of failure warnings. These warnings absorbed the crew’s concentration, invalidating FAA certification assumptions on crew reaction times for critical trim failures. As a result, the FAA required additional crew alert and procedure changes for the MAX.
November 20, 2020, ©. Leeham News: This week’s big news is the lifting of the grounding of Boeing’s 737 MAX.
I wrote about the changes made to the MAX Wednesday and why I believe it’s safe. Let’s use our Corner space to walk through what I wrote about, but with a more technical angle.
By Bjorn Fehrm
November 18, 2020, ©. Leeham News: The FAA has declared the Boeing 737 MAX 8 and 9 safe to fly after a 20 months grounding. On March 10, 2019, the Ethiopian Air ET302 crashed after Boeing’s pitch augmentation software MCAS triggered erroneously and caused the aircraft to crash. This accident followed a similar accident of Lion Air JT610 on October 29, 2018.
Ethiopia grounded the MAX on the day, China the day after, and the FAA on March 13. The 737 MAX has been grounded worldwide since the FAA grounding.
It has been a gruesome 20 months for Boeing, where it’s gone from denial of guilt to a full acceptance of responsibility and a complete change of attitude. With changes to the MAX verified by FAA, EASA, Transport Canada, and Brazil’s ANAC, it’s now ready to fly again.
We will cover the return to flight of the 737 MAX in several articles, the first dealing with the question: Is the 737 MAX safe to fly?
Below we go through what went wrong and why this chain of events will not happen again on an updated 737 MAX.
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By Bjorn Fehrm
September 14, 2020, © Leeham News: The FAA and EASA Safety of Flight authorities have examined and test flown the changes Boeing has done to the 737 MAX to make it safe to fly again. Everything points to these authorities re-certifying the 737 MAX as safe to fly in the coming months.
In a Saturday article Dominic Gates of The Seattle Times quotes from a recent interview with me and an experienced 737 Captain, Mike Gerzanics, where we both say we consider the MAX safe to fly with the changes.
Here my reasons as an aeronautical engineer why I think so.
Dec. 11, 2019, © Leeham News: A new round of Congressional Hearings about the Boeing 737 MAX got underway today.
FAA Administrator Stephen Dickson, testifying today before the US House Transportation Committee in a hearing about the Boeing 737 MAX.
Before the hearing began at the House Transportation Committee, FAA Administrator Steve Dickson appeared on CNBC today. Among his statements: recertification of the MAX will slip to 2020, confirming what had become apparent for some time.
“Like I said there are a number of processes, milestones, that have to be completed,” Dickson said in an interview on “Squawk Box.” “If you just do the math, it’s going to extend into 2020,” he told CNBC.
Nov. 4, 2019, © Leeham News: Last week’s Congressional hearings about the Boeing 737 MAX crisis was just as I expected: theatre, lots of grandstanding, little substance and testimony that elicited little in the way of new information.
The US Senate hearing was a perfect example of playing to the television by many Senators.
The House hearing certainly had its share, but in more lucid moments, some House members produced new documents that were especially damning to Boeing.
Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg and John Hamilton, VP and chief engineer, did no harm to Boeing, which was probably the prime objective. (Hamilton is no relation to me.)
Muilenburg did harm to himself, however, and some Members of Congress landed some damning blows.