Ethiopia to present the first official report on the Boeing 737 MAX tragedy and point to the MCAS system

The MCAS automatic stabilization system, involved in the October accident of a 737 MAX 8 in Indonesia, it was also activated on the Ethiopian Airlines plane shortly before crashing on March 10, he told the agency on Friday AFP a source close to the case, while The Ethiopian Ministry of Transport is expected to present its first official report on the incident on Monday.

The discovery of MCAS would be part of the preliminary findings of the badysis of the black boxes of flight 302 of Ethiopian Airlines, which killed 157 people in eastern Addis Ababa, the source said anonymously.

He added that the information was presented Thursday to US authorities, including the Federal Aviation Agency (FAA)who badyze the information provided by Ethiopia.

This does not preclude US regulators from revising their findings, the source warned, confirming the information published by the Wall Street Journal.

The Ethiopian authorities had already foreseen that there would be "Clear similarities" between the accidents of Flight 302 of Ethiopian Airlines and Flight 610 of Lion Air of October 29 that left 189 dead.

In both cases, regulators and aeronautical experts felt that the MCAS (Maneuverability Enhancement System) stabilization system played an important role. This system was installed in the 737 MAX to compensate for the aerodynamic problems caused by the change of location and the weight of the two engines of the aircraft.

Boeing defends MCAS but announces changes

The family of Jackson Musoni, a 31-year-old Rwandan traveling aboard Ethiopian flight 302, Boeing accuses of having devised a faulty MCAS stabilization system.

"There was a reconfiguration of the plane, which means that the engines were ahead (…), undoubtedly changing the shape of the fuselage and ultimately altering the aerodynamics ", he said to the AFP by phone Steven Marks, lawyer of the Musoni family.

"We can not comment on the request, we offer our condolences to the families and the environment of the pbadengers of the company Ethiopian Airlines. Boeing continues to participate in research and is working with authorities to evaluate new information as it becomes available. " said a spokesman for the American company in an email.

The fleet of 737 MAX has been grounded since mid-March after the crash of Ethiopian Airlines, the second incident involving this aircraft in less than five months. As a result, Boeing has entered an unprecedented crisis and the remaining 737 MAx orders, valued at $ 500,000 million, are uncertain.

The The first elements of the investigation of the Lion Air 737 MAX indicate that one of the sensors that recorded the angle of attack of the aircraft, that is to say the position of the nose, was defective. but he continued to convey this misinformation to the system, including the MCAS, He continued to try to plunge the plane, when it was not necessary, to recover speed despite attempts by the pilots to straighten it. In the incident, 189 people died.

It will probably take several months to know the causes of these two accidents.

The US Department of Justice has opened a criminal investigation into the development of the 737 MAX, an audit of the MCAS certification is underway.

Boeing introduced On Wednesday, the changes to the MCAS are intended to "strengthen" it in order to restore public confidence and convince the authorities to lift the flight ban imposed on the 737 MAX.

The builder of the plane rejected the idea that these changes suggested that the initial design was inadequate.

"The procedure we observed with regulators in aircraft design has always led to increased safety of aircraftsaid a Boeing executive, who added that "the rigor and depth of the MAX's design and the tests we are doing allow us to say that the changes we are making" would have prevented both accidents .

The intervention of the MCAS will be more transparent for the crew, and the pilots will be able to avoid it more easily in case of a problem, said the aircraft builder with reference to the planned new changes.

The goal is to prevent the activation of this system following erroneous informationsaid Boeing, who also planned to better train pilots in the subtleties of MCAS and the 737 MAX.

With information from AFP and Reuters