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Boeing 737 Max ‘Won’t Fly Before August’

: May 30, 2019 - : 6:33 am

The grounded Boeing 737 Max fleet isn’t expected to return to the skies for at least another 10 weeks, according to the airline industry’s main trade body, International Air Transport Association (IATA) .

The aircraft manufacturer is under immense global pressure to satisfy regulators and airlines that the 737 Max plane is safe after the crash of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 on March 10, which killed all 157 people on board. In the wake of two crashes, the aircraft was grounded by regulators, and although Boeing has been working on a fix to allay safety concerns, it is likely to remain out of service for another 10 to 12 weeks, into peak season for many airlines.

Investigators have said there are “clear similarities” between that flight and another Max crash in Indonesia in October that killed all 189 on board.

Speaking in Seoul ahead of the association’s annual meeting, the IATA Director General, Alexandre de Juniac, said airlines were not expecting a return to service within the next 10 to 12 weeks, “But it is not our hands. That is in the hands of regulators.” He however, expressed hope to see a unified global timetable for the model’s reintroduction.

IATA is planning a summit meeting between airlines, regulators and Boeing in July to discuss a coordinated timeline to restore the 737 Max to commercial flying, De Juniac said. “We hope that [the regulators] will align their timeframe,” he said.

According to Reuters, sources at ICAO, the UN aviation agency, believe the FAA will approve the 737 Max again as soon as late June.

De Juniac said prolonged grounding was “taking its toll” on airlines. Although IATA expects its 290 airline members to be recording a 10th consecutive year of aggregate profit, he said the 737 was adding to headwinds including “rising costs, trade wars and other uncertainties [that] are likely to have an impact on the bottom line”.

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