Boeing's CEO reportedly asked President Trump to not ground its plane that has crashed twice in 5 months (BA)
- President Donald Trump spoke with Boeing's CEO about the second deadly crash of one the company's planes in the past five months, The New York Times reported on Tuesday.
- The US is one of a handful of countries that did not ground the 737 Max 8 on Tuesday after the Ethiopian Airlines disaster.
- A Boeing official told The Times that the conversation was only to reiterate the plane's safety.
As the European Union and many other countries throughout the world were moving to keep Boeing 737 Max 8’s — the plane involved in Sunday’s Ethiopian Airlines crash — out of their airspace, the plane maker’s CEO was apparently working behind the scenes to keep the same happening in the US.
Dennis Muilenburg, chief executive of Chicago-Based Boeing, spoke to President Donald Trump on the phone Tuesday morning in order to keep the plane from being grounded in the US, the New York Times reported, citing two people familiar with the call.
In a statement to the Times reporter, a Boeing official said that Muilenberg only "reiterated our position that the Max is a safe aircraft," on the call with Trump.
Boeing did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
UPDATE: A @Boeing official said that during the call with TRUMP this morning, the @BoeingCEO “reiterated our position that the Max is a safe aircraft.”
— Kenneth P. Vogel (@kenvogel) March 12, 2019
About two-thirds of the world’s 737 Max 8 fleet has been grounded, the Times calculated. On Tuesday, the European Area Safety Administration, EUSA, moved to ban the plane, citing the need to ensure the safety of passengers following the crash of the Ethiopian Airlines Flight ET302 on Sunday.
The plane has also been banned from China, Indonesia, Singapore, Australia and more.
Meanwhile, several US senators have urged the Federal Aviation Administration to ban the plane. As it stands currently, the plane is still considered safe to fly by the US and Canada.
President Trump did little to quell fears about the plane's safety when he tweeted without evidence on Tuesday that modern planes were becoming "too complex to fly." To be sure, data shows that air travel has become significantly safer in recent decades, despite the two recent crashes.
More about the Boeing 737 MAX 8 and the Ethiopian Airlines disaster:
- Everything we know about Ethiopian Airlines’ deadly crash of a Boeing 737 Max 8, the second disaster involving the plane in 5 monthsSeven airlines and 5 countries have grounded the Boeing 737 Max 8 after a 2nd crash involving the plane killed 157 people — here's who's taken action so far
- Europe has banned the Boeing 737 MAX — a plane that has crashed twice since October
- Boeing has $400 billion in orders on the books, 80% of them are for the 737
- 'I don't want Albert Einstein to be my pilot': Trump says airplanes are becoming 'too complex to fly' as the UK, China, and other nations ground the Boeing 737 Max 8 –
- A major flight-attendants union is calling on US regulators to investigate the plane involved in 2 crashes in 5 months
- These are the victims of the Boeing 737 Max 8 crash in Ethiopia
- Germany, the UK, China, and other countries have grounded the Boeing 737 Max 8 after its 2 deadly crashes — here's who's taken action so far
- FAA says Boeing 737 Max 8, the plane that's crashed twice in 5 months, is still safe to fly
- Southwest has the largest exposure of all US airlines to Boeing's 737 Max
- Elected officials are calling on the US government to ground the Boeing 737 Max 8 after the plane was involved in 2 deadly crashes
- The black box from the crashed Ethiopian Airlines flight has been found
- 'If it’s Boeing, I’m not going’: People are freaking out about flying on the same plane that has now crashed twice in 5 months
- The family of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 captain speaks out after crash that killed 157 people
- A Georgetown University law student who reportedly expressed a fear of flying is among the 157 dead in the Ethiopian Airlines crash
- An Ethiopian Airlines passenger said he missed the crashed flight by 2 minutes: 'I'm grateful to be alive'
- People of 35 different nationalities were killed in the Ethiopian Airlines crash, including 8 Americans