Families of Lion Air crash victims ask why Boeing 737 MAX not grounded before deadly Ethiopian Airlines accident

Since the tragedy in Ethiopia, deliveries of Boeing’s bestselling 737 MAX jets have been halted and the company’s shares have fallen nearly 13 per cent

Aviation experts have noted eerie similarities between Sunday’s accident and the crash of the same model of plane in Indonesia in October

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Distraught family members of the crashed Indonesian Lion Air JT-610 seen at Pangkal Pinang airport on October 29, 2018. Photo: AFP

Published: 8:28am, 15 Mar 2019Updated: 9:21am, 15 Mar 2019

When Anton Sahadi heard about the Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 MAX 8 jet that crashed on Sunday leaving no survivors, he felt both sorrow and indignation.

The 29-year-old’s cousins Ravi Andrian and Riyan Aryandi died after the same model of aircraft operated by Indonesia’s Lion Air crashed into the Java Sea on October 29, killing all 189 passengers and crew.

At the time, relatives questioned if the 737 MAX, which had only entered service in 2017, needed to be grounded over safety concerns, but the Indonesian government said operators need do nothing more than carry out additional checks.

Then came the crash in Ethiopia. At first, Indonesia’s aviation authorities only ordered the country’s domestic airlines suspend operations of their MAX 8 aircraft for a week, but after the US Federal Aviation Administration issued an emergency order on Wednesday grounding the narrow body aircraft, within 24 hours Indonesia was following suit. Lion Air operates 10 MAX 8 jets, while flagship carrier Garuda Indonesia has one.

“I felt hurt when I heard that the jet involved in the Ethiopian air crash was the same [model],” said Sahadi. “It seems like the government brushed off our demands, they need to be firmer. The authority is too late to act, why didn’t they ground [these] jets after the Lion Air crash?”

China’s Boeing ban signals challenge to US civil aviation dominance

Sahadi’s is among the two dozen families of victims of the Lion Air crash suing Boeing in Chicago, where the plane manufacturer is based.

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