(HEJERE, Ethiopia) — The Federal Aviation Administration says new evidence from the Ethiopian Airlines crash site coupled with its own data gathering led it to order the grounding of Boeing 737 Max planes.
The agency’s order Wednesday said new information had been uncovered from the wreckage of the Ethiopian Airlines jet. That, taken together with data from satellite-based tracking of the plane’s flight path, pointed to similarities with an October crash of a Lion Air 737 Max in the Java Sea.
The FAA said it was ordering the jets’ grounding while investigators determine whether there was a shared cause of the two crashes.
The agency’s move Wednesday came after it had faced mounting criticism for backing the airworthiness of the 737 Max jets as countries around the world were grounding them.
For its part, Boeing said it supported the FAA’s move out of an abundance of caution and to reassure the flying public of the aircrafts’ safety. But it said it continues to have full confidence in the safety of the 737 Max planes.
