US FAA chief boosting oversight of Boeing after MAX 9 emergency

The head of the US Federal Aviation Administration told lawmakers on Tuesday that the agency is stepping up oversight of Boeing in the wake of a 737 MAX 9 mid-air emergency.

FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker told the House transportation and infrastructure aviation subcommittee the agency was “aggressively expanding oversight of new aircraft with increased floor presence at all Boeing facilities... We will follow the data and take appropriate and necessary action.”

The FAA, acting after a cabin panel blew out during flight on a new Alaska Airlines MAX 9, took the unprecedented action of barring Boeing from expanding production of its 737 MAX until it addresses quality issues.

Whitaker declined to put a timeframe on lifting the restriction, saying in an interview with CNBC that the FAA will lift it “when we’ve got our arms around the situation... and we’re convinced that this is a safe production system.”

The FAA grounded 171 MAX 9 jets on January 6, resulting in thousands of flight cancellations by Alaska Airlines and United Airlines. The grounding was lifted on Jan. 24 and the agency said on Monday 94 per cent of the jets have returned to service.

Lawmakers on the US House committee last week asked Whitaker to answer whether the agency has found “any evidence of persistent quality control lapses in any of Boeing’s production lines.”

The FAA, which did not have a permanent administrator for 18 months until Whitaker’s 98-0 confirmation, has come under growing scrutiny after a series of potentially catastrophic near-miss aviation safety incidents, persistent air traffic control staffing shortages and a January 2023 pilot messaging database outage that disrupted 11,000 flights.

Boeing last week said it was withdrawing a safety exemption request for the MAX 7 awaiting certification. Whitaker said on Tuesday Boeing “did the right thing to pull back on their requests.”