US lawmakers have accused the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) of obstructing investigation into the certification of the troubled Boeing 737 Max that was grounded 15 months ago.
The chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce and Transport Roger Wicker, in a statement accused FAA of failing to respond to more than half of committee requests for documents.
The once best-selling airplane (Boeing 737 Max) has been grounded since March 2019 after two fatal crashes in five months killed 346 passengers.
This included Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 that crashed near Addis Ababa airport just six minutes after takeoff, killing all the 157 passengers on board including 32 Kenyans, in March 2019.
“I would note that 12 of the requests that FAA has not responded to pertain directly to the 737 Max certification —directly to today’s matter,” Wicker told FAA chief Stephen Dickson during a committee hearing Wednesday.
Mr Wicker noted that the lack of responses forced committee staff to seek interviews with FAA staff in October.
But the interviews, Wicker says, have been slow to the extent that in seven months, the committee’s investigation has only interviewed four FAA staff members out of the 21 they targeted.
PAYE Tax Calculator
Note: The results are not exact but very close to the actual.
