Max Disasters Fuel Outcry Over How FAA Let Boeing Self-Certify
- Planemaker signs off on more than 90% of aircraft designs
- Boeing, FAA missed risks during original approval of 737 Max
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After his daughter Samya died in the crash of a Boeing Co. 737 Max in Ethiopia, Massachusetts lawyer Michael Stumo was stunned to learn that key decisions on the plane’s design were approved by the company.
Under a decades-old system that was expanded several times since 2005 by Congress, aviation regulators delegate some certification work to aircraft manufacturers, and that was the case on significant elements of the 737 Max system implicated in two fatal crashes.