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After two deadly disasters in five months, can Boeing survive?
Within three minutes of takeoff, Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 had
accelerated to unusually high speeds. Captain Yared Getachew knew
something was wrong as the aircraft, a Boeing 737 Max 8, erratically
dipped and climbed by hundreds of feet. He radioed air traffic control, requesting a return to Addis Ababa Airport.
He was cleared to return and the aircraft began to turn right,
climbing even higher. A minute later, flight 302 disappeared from the
radar.
All 157 people on board were killed as the plane crashed 30 miles south east of the airport,
approximately six minutes into its two hour flight to Nairobi. It was
the second fatal accident involving a Boeing 737 Max 8 in five months,
following the crash last October of a Lion Air flight in Indonesia with
the loss of 189 lives.
Suspicion
over the cause of both crashes is centred on the plane’s new flight
control system MCAS, or Manoeuvring Characteristics Augmentation
System which can intervene to push the plane’s nose down automatically
when it rises.
