The notorious MAS which was suspected by many to be the cause of the Lion Air accident in 2018 end may not be the cause in the Ethiopian Airlines ET302 accident. The reason why the big regulators like UK, France, Singapore, Australia and many other are imposing a ban on the B-737 Max to even enter their airspace points to a lack of trust in FAA and Boeing and the actions taken by them in the past.

Read my blog “A question of safety or ethics” http://safetymatters.co.in/2019/01/10/a-question-of-safety-or-ethicsboeing-737.

There was a legal case in the USA in early 2018 where the court had overruled the immunity clause that manufacturers had enjoyed for design defect. The court also documents that Boeing has been aware of known design defects in their aircrafts.

Boeing has paid huge compensation in terms of legal damage after the series of accidents starting in late 1980’s. Had they grounded the B737 early and modified them or admitted to oversight of certain aspects in training, manufacturing etc, they would have been seen as a responsible OEM and FAA as a responsible regulator.

The series of incidents of battery fire on the B787 Dreamliner where NTSB has pulled up both FAA and Boeing for design defects has caused irreparable damage to the reputation of the regulator and OEM.

The final investigation report of the FlyDubai accident at Rostov should also be released and the Ethiopian Airlines accident in Beirut should be investigated again. This amongst many investigations which haven’t been conducted properly or have overlooked certain key facts. Many other final reports are still not available.

Its time to wait and watch the outcome of the investigations and this time the whole world is keeping an eye on them so that facts are not hidden and truth revealed.