The Ethiopian Airlines crew ended up turning the control system back on before the plane crashed, killing all 157 people aboard. Data retrieved from the Ethiopian Airlines jet’s black box suggest that the flight-control feature, called the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), automatically activated before the crash. Earlier this month, the Federal Aviation Administration agency grounded all Boeing 737 Max planes, saying it had identified similarities between the Ethiopian Airlines crash and the Lion Air crash in Indonesia six months earlier. A lawsuit against Boeing Co was filed in US federal court last week in what appeared to be the first suit over the Ethiopian Airlines 737 MAX crash. Boeing is still preparing software updates for the 737 Max plane’s flight-control system.

Source: The North Africa Journal April 04, 2019 16:07 UTC