FAA Proposes Requiring Four Key Boeing 737 MAX Design Changes

The Federal Aviation Administration said on Monday that it is proposing requiring four key Boeing 737 MAX design changes to address safety issues seen in two crashes that killed 346 people and led to the plane’s grounding in March 2019. Al Jazeera reports: The agency is issuing a proposed airworthiness directive to require updated flight-control software, revised display-processing software to generate alerts, revising certain flight-crew operating procedures, and changing the routing of some wiring bundles. The announcement is significant, but there are still other major steps, including finalizing pilot-training procedures, that must be completed before the 737 MAX can resume flights. The public has 45 days to comment on the changes, and it is still unclear if flights will resume before the end of 2020. The FAA said in a separate 96-page report released on Monday that it “has preliminarily determined that Boeing’s proposed changes to the 737 MAX design, flight crew procedures and maintenance procedures effectively mitigate the airplane-related safety issues” in the two fatal crashes. The airworthiness directive seeks to require Boeing changes. The FAA said the changes minimize “dependence on pilot action and the effect of any potential single failure.”