The first conclusions from the technical analysis on two black boxes from the Boeing 737 Max airplane that crashed in Ethiopia could take several days, officials said, as regulators around the world awaited word on whether it's safe to resume flying the jets. More than 40 countries — including the U.S., Canada, India, China and Russia — have grounded the planes or refused to let them into their airspace. A spokesperson for France's BEA air accident investigation agency said the flight data and cockpit voice recorders have been delivered. Investigators in will now begin seeking clues into what caused the disaster that's angered scores of mourning families. Data in the boxes is critical to finding out what caused the new aircraft to plunge to the ground shortly after taking off from Addis Ababa on Sunday, killing all 157 people aboard. It was the second crash involving a 737 Max in less than five months. Big financial implications for industry Possible links between the accidents have rocked the aviation industry, scared passengers worldwide, and left the world's biggest plane-maker scrambling to prove the safety of a money-spinning model intended to be the standard for decades. On Thursday afternoon, Boeing announced it would pause deliveries of 737 Max jetliners. Nearly 5,000 Maxes are on order from the company, meaning potentially huge financial implications for the industry. A case containing the black boxes from the crashed Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 Max 8 was delivered to the headquarters of France's BEA air accident investigation agency in Le Bourget, north of Paris, on Thursday. (Philippe Wojazer/Reuters) Boeing, which maintained its planes were safe to fly, said in a statement that it supported the U.S. regulators who grounded the plane. "Boeing has determined — out of an abundance of caution and in order to reassure the flying public of the aircraft's safety — to recommend to the FAA the temporary suspension of operations of the entire global fleet of 371 737 Max aircraft." The FAA, the National Transportation Safety Board, the Ethiopian civil aviation authority and Boeing have been investigating the crash at the site, some 60 kilometres outside the Ethiopian capital. 'We saw where he died and touched the earth' On Thursday, some relatives of the dead stormed out of a meeting with Ethiopian Airlines, decrying a lack of transparency, while others made the painful trip to the arid farmland where the passenger jet crashed. "I can't find you! Where are you?" said one Ethiopian woman, draped in traditional white mourning shawl, as she held a framed portrait of her brother in the charred and debris-strewn field. Investigators with the U.S. National Transportation and Safety Board look over debris at the crash site. (Jemal Countess/Getty Images) "We saw where he died and touched the earth," said Sultan Al-Mutairi, who had come from Riyadh to mourn his brother, Saad, who ran a recruitment agency in Nairobi and perished in the crash. Experts say it could take weeks or months to identify the victims, as their remains were scattered, charred and in fragments due to the impact of the crash and ensuing fire. Frustration is growing among the families of victims of the crash who are in Addis Ababa, with many of them asking Ethiopian Airlines for greater transparency. Airline officials said they have opened a call-in centre that is available 18 hours a day to respond to questions by family members. But angry family left the meeting at a hotel in Addis Ababa, saying there were not getting enough answers. Same cause as Lion Air crash? The weekend crash is the second since October that occurred just after takeoff. In October, a Lion Air plane crashed in Indonesia. Fresh information from the wreckage in Ethiopia and newly refined data about the plane's flight path indicated some similarities between the two disasters "that warrant further investigation of the possibility of a shared cause," the FAA said in a statement. The cause of the Indonesian crash is still being investigated. A November preliminary report, before the retrieval of the cockpit voice recorder, focused on maintenance and training and the response of a Boeing anti-stall system to a recently replaced sensor, but gave no reason for the crash. The pilot of that aircraft had reported internal control problems and received permission to return, before the plane came down and burst into a fireball on arid farmland. Pilots on at least two U.S. flights have reported an automated system seemed to cause their Max 8 planes to tilt down suddenly. The 737 is the most popular commercial jetliner of all time, and Boeing has seen strong demand for the latest iteration, the 737 Max. (David Ryder/Bloomberg) The pilots said the tilt occurred soon after they engaged autopilot. In both cases, they recovered quickly after disconnecting the autopilot. U.S. lawmakers said after a briefing with the acting head of the FAA on Thursday that Max 8 and 9 planes will remain grounded for "weeks" at a minimum, until a software upgrade could be tested and installed in all of the planes. FAA administrator Dan Elwell told reporters on Wednesday the software update will be ready within a couple of months. But that may not be enough to allow the planes to be ungrounded depending on the findings. Rep. Rick Larsen, from Washington state, said after the briefing the software upgrade would take a few weeks to complete and installing on all aircraft would take "at least through April." He said additional training would also have to take place. Deliveries of Boeing's bestselling 737 Max jets were effectively frozen, though production continued, industry sources said. With the uncertainty hanging over the 737 Max, a French presidential source said European plane-maker Airbus and Ethiopian Airlines are discussing a possible new contract as part of the airline's fleet overhaul. The official said French President Emmanuel Macron and Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed had spoken about a possible new contract during Macron's visit to Addis Ababa this week. Airlines operating the 737 Max jets that have been delivered since its 2017 debut said they had cancelled some of their flights and rearranged schedules to use other jets in their fleets. "Our goal is to operate our schedule with every available aircraft in our fleet to meet our customers' expectations during the busy spring travel season," said U.S. carrier Southwest Airlines Co., the world's biggest operator of the plane.<doc-sep>Air crash investigators have begun analysing the black box data recorder from Ethiopian Airlines flight 302, amid reports that the plane wreckage suggested similarities with a previous disaster involving the Boeing 737 Max jet. Accounts have also emerged of communications between the plane and air traffic control, in which the pilot is said to have asked in panicked tones to turn back three minutes into the flight, as the 737 Max dipped and climbed. The black box recorder, which arrived in Paris showing some external damage, is being reviewed by French aviation experts at the request of Ethiopian Airlines. French authorities have said it was unclear what data could be retrieved to shed light on Sunday’s crash, which killed 157 people outside Addis Ababa. It is likely to be several days before any interim findings are released, according to Ethiopian Airlines chief executive Tewolde Gebremariam. Evidence gathered by investigators at the scene of the crash, according to two sources cited by Reuters, includes a piece of the plane’s stabiliser, which was set in an unusual position – potentially suggesting similarities with the Lion Air crash off Jakarta in October. Gebremariam said there was a “clear similarity between our crash and the Lion Air crash.” Inquiries in Indonesia have focused on how an automated system used the stabiliser to pitch the nose down, against the pilots’ commands. The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and Boeing declined to comment on the claims. 01:34 Ethiopia plane crash: what we know about the disaster so far – video The captain of Ethiopian flight 302, Yared Getachew, reported a “flight control” problem in a calm voice, before then asking to return in panicked tones three minutes after takeoff, according to the New York Times. The newspaper, citing a source who had reviewed the communications from flight 302, said the pilot told controllers: “Break break, request back to home.” The 737 Max jet initially dipped below the safe flight path, and then, after climbing, flew at erratic height and speed. Controllers noticed the plane was moving up and down by hundreds of feet. When grounding the 737 Max model on Wednesday, the FAA said new data from satellite-based tracking showed similarities between the planes’ erratic movements in both crashes. Boeing has reiterated its “full confidence” in the safety of the plane, although its engineers are making changes to the software in question in the Lion Air crash. Ethiopian Airlines said its pilots had been trained on procedures to deal with the 737 Max’s anti-stall system, which was the subject of an emergency notification by regulators after the Lion Air crash. Pilots in the US have expressed fury that Boeing had not already highlighted system changes that could affect the plane’s behaviour. Delivery of the new plane, with almost 5,000 models still on order, has been paused, although Boeing is continuing production. Russian carrier Aeroflot said on Friday it may cancel its order for 20 planes. Air Canada, which planned to expand from 24 to 36 737 Max planes in its fleet this year, told investors it was suspending its financial forecasts without the more fuel-efficient jets. In Ethiopia, officials have started taking DNA samples from families of the victims to assist in identifying remains. The 157 people who died came from 35 countries, including nine from the UK. At the crash site in Hejere, about 30 miles from Addis Ababa, search teams continued to pick through the debris, with the plane’s wreckage covered by blue plastic sheeting. Relatives were still waiting for news on when identification of remains would begin, and subsequent repatriation. Faysal Hussein, an Ethiopian citizen whose cousin was killed, told the Associated Press: “We are not told what they have found so far. We were taken to the crash site on Wednesday but not allowed to get a closer look.” Pauline Gathu, a Kenyan who lost her brother, said: “We were expecting that we will have our body well-kept but we are amazed to hear that there is nothing, totally nothing … We don’t have words, we don’t know what to do.”<doc-sep>ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — The Latest on Ethiopian plane crash: 7:35 p.m. (all times local): Ethiopia’s transport minister says the black box from the plane crash one week is in good condition. Dagmawit Moges told reporters on Sunday evening that data so far shows there is a “clear similarity” between the Ethiopian Airlines crash and an earlier one in Indonesia that involved the same type of plane. Officials say 157 people from 35 different countries were killed when the Nairobi-bound plane crashed shortly after takeoff. The crash of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 and an earlier Lion Air crash have prompted the United States and other countries to ground Boeing 737 Max 8 planes. The U.S.-based Boeing faces the challenge of proving the jets are safe to fly amid suspicions that faulty sensors and software contributed to the two crashes in less than six months. ___ Thousands mourned the Ethiopian plane crash victims on Sunday, accompanying 17 empty caskets draped in the national flag through the streets of the capital as some victims’ relatives fainted and fell to the ground. The service came one day after officials began delivering bags of earth to family members of the 157 victims of the crash instead of the remains of their loved ones because the identification process is expected to take such a long time. Family members confirmed they were given a 1 kilogram (2.2 pound) sack of scorched earth taken from the crash site. Many relatives already have gathered at the rural, dusty crash site outside Ethiopia’s capital. The victims Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 came from 35 countries and included many humanitarian workers headed to Nairobi. Elias Bilew said he had worked with one of the victims, Sintayehu Shafi, for the past eight years. “He was such a good person,” Bilew said. “He doesn’t deserve this. He was the pillar for his whole family.” French investigators said Saturday night that they had successfully downloaded the cockpit recorder data and had transferred it to the Ethiopian investigation team without listening to the audio files. Work on the flight data recorder resumed Sunday but no additional details were given. Experts from the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board and the plane’s manufacturer Boeing are among those involved in the investigation. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration has said satellite-based tracking data shows that the movements of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 were similar to those of Lion Air Flight 610, which crashed off Indonesia in October, killing 189 people. Both involved Boeing 737 Max 8 planes. The planes in both crashes flew with erratic altitude changes that could indicate the pilots struggled to control the aircraft. Shortly after their takeoffs, both crews tried to return to the airports but crashed. The United States and many other countries have now grounded the Max 8s as the U.S.-based company faces the challenge of proving the jets are safe to fly amid suspicions that faulty sensors and software contributed to the two crashes that killed 346 people in less than six months. ___ Associated Press writer Angela Charlton in Paris contributed to this report. Elias Meseret, The Associated Press<doc-sep>
The black boxes from the Ethiopian Airlines plane that crashed on Sunday have been sent to France for analysis. The decision not to send them to the US could be seen as a snub, as the plane, a Boeing 737 Max 8, was manufactured by an American company. Ethiopian Airlines' director of public relations said that sending the data recorders to Europe and not the US was a strategic decision for the airline and the Ethiopian government, Bloomberg reported. The US initially hesitated to ground the 737 Max, even as the European Union and several countries banned the planes from their airspace. The US on Wednesday reversed its decision. Ethiopia sent the black boxes from the crashed Ethiopian Airlines plane to France in what could be seen as a snub to the US. An official from the French aviation-investigation authority, BEA, told The Associated Press on Thursday morning that the flight-data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder had arrived in France for analysis. The official did not say how long that analysis might take. Investigators are trying to find out why the four-month-old Boeing 737 Max 8 aircraft crashed shortly after taking off from Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, on Sunday, killing all 157 people on board. The decision to send the so-called black boxes to France is unusual, as France and other European countries typically deal with investigations into incidents involving European plane manufacturers, such as Airbus. Asrat Begashaw, Ethiopian Airlines' director of public relations, said that sending the data recorders to Europe and not the US was a strategic decision for the airline and the Ethiopian government, Bloomberg reported. People walking past a part of the wreckage. REUTERS/Tiksa Negeri Bloomberg described the decision as a sign that authorities in the US "aren't trusted to determine the cause of the disaster after ruling that the model is safe to fly." The AP said that the BEA "has experience with global air crashes, and its expertise is often sought whenever an Airbus plane crashes because the manufacturer is based in France." According to the BEA's website, the last time the authority investigated an incident involving a Boeing 737 plane was in 2013, and it last investigated an incident involving a Boeing plane, a Boeing 777, in 2017. The headquarters of France's BEA aviation-investigation agency in Le Bourget. REUTERS/Philippe Wojazer Reuters reported that US and Ethiopian aviation-safety officials discussed on Tuesday whether the data recorders "would go to Washington or London for download and analysis." The US has a subordiante role in the investigation. The US National Transportation Safety Board said on Thursday that is dispatching three investigators to France to assist with analysis. It said they are "being assisted by technical advisers from the Federal Aviation Administration, Boeing and GE/Safran, the manufacturer of the engines." Ethiopia announced that it would send the data recorders to Europe as the US Federal Aviation Administration continued to express confidence in the 737 Max, even as several countries around the world banned the planes from their airspace. After initially holding out on grounding the planes, the US reversed its decision on Wednesday. The Boeing 737 Max fleet. Boeing The Ethiopian Airlines plane was the second Boeing 737 Max 8 airliner involved in a fatal crash in five months. In October, Lion Air Flight 610 crashed in the Java Sea shortly after taking off from Jakarta, Indonesia, killing all 189 people on board. Investigations into both crashes are ongoing. Boeing said on Tuesday that it would update 737 Max software that may cause the plane's nose to turn down. The FAA said on Wednesday that similarities in the crashes "warrant further investigation of the possibility of a shared cause for the two incidents that needs to be better understood and addressed."