None of the evidence so far from investigations into Boeing’s new 737 MAX justifies ditching the U.S. system for evaluating commercial airplane safety, GOP lawmakers warned during a Wednesday hearing in which House Democrats questioned regulators.
“Jumping to conclusions only serves to erode confidence in the U.S. aviation system when the safety record absolutely speaks for itself,” said Rep. Sam Graves, the highest-ranking Republican on the House Transportation Committee. An pilot himself, the Missouri Republican struck a more cautious tone than lawmakers from both parties at a Senate hearing in late March, two weeks after the airliner’s second crash in five months prompted regulators around the world to ground it.
The catastrophes, which occurred overseas and together killed 346 people, have halted deliveries of the best-selling plane in Boeing’s history, snarled airline schedules for the foreseeable future, and prompted Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao to seek a review of the jetliner’s initial certification for commercial flights.
But while it’s important to learn as much as possible from the crashes, “we need to be careful to make sure we’re not acting on emotion, that we’re not making this political, that we’re operating on facts, and we’re truly taking steps that are going to improve aviation safety,” said Rep. Garrett Graves, R-La. “The changes and the reforms that we make in the wake of these accidents must be based on fact and must preserve the essence of the aviation system that has led to this unprecedented level of safety right here in the U.S.”
[Related: Half of airline passengers afraid of Boeing 737 MAX after crashes]
Since 1997, the risk of a fatal commercial aviation accident in the country has dropped 94%, with only one death in the past 10 years, which occurred when a mid-flight engine failure shattered the window of a Southwest Airlines jet in 2018. The Boeing 737 MAX crashes have nonetheless raised questions worldwide about the Federal Aviation Administration’s approval of the plane for commercial flight, said Rep. Peter DeFazio, the Democratic chairman of the transportation committee.
The latest version of a plane flown since 1967, the 737 MAX underwent less rigorous scrutiny beforehand than a totally new model would have, and the FAA relied heavily on inspections done by Boeing employees themselves under a system that delegates some duties to nonagency employees and organizations, including companies, with particular expertise.
Currently, 79 organizations are authorized to handle such duties, acting administrator Daniel Elwell has said, though the FAA retains the right to intervene directly at any time. Its personnel are always involved in level-of-safety determinations and establishment of rules for special situations, he added.
Evaluation of the 737 MAX, from Boeing’s first permit application to the plane’s final certification in March 2017, took five years and included 297 flight tests, some of which involved the anti-stall software linked to both crashes, Elwell said.
“In the U.S., the 737 MAX will return to service only when the FAA’s analysis of facts and technical data indicate that it is safe to do so,” Elwell said Wednesday.
In the first crash, in Indonesia in October, a malfunctioning sensor on a 737 MAX 8 fed incorrect data on the airliner’s ascent vector to the computer system, which attempted to lower the angle at which it was ascending to avoid a stall, officials said. That prompted a struggle between the new computer software, known as the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, and the pilot, who ultimately lost control of the aircraft.
U.S. regulators have ordered airlines to update operations manuals on the handling of such issues and Boeing is developing a software patch. The fact that it hadn’t been completed was part of what prompted the high level of concern after the second crash, which occurred outside the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa.
It wasn’t until data transmitted to satellites from the flight showed climbs and descents during takeoff, similar to those before the Indonesia crash, that the FAA ordered carriers to park the planes. Regulators in the European Union, China, and Canada had already done so.
“We’ve got to get to the bottom of this,” DeFazio said, noting that the FAA has only recently begun submitting documents his committee requested a few months ago and Boeing hasn’t yet turned over any of them. “We shouldn’t have to be here today. We shouldn’t have to have tragedies to change the rules if the rules need to be changed.”
