American Airlines Resumes 737 MAX Passenger Flights
December 29 2020 - 10:22AM
Dow Jones News
By Andrew Tangel
American Airlines Group Inc. is putting passengers back on
Boeing Co.'s 737 MAX on Tuesday for the first since the aircraft
was grounded nearly two years ago following two deadly crashes.
American Flight 718 was scheduled to depart Miami International
Airport at 10:32 a.m. and land at LaGuardia Airport at 1:30 p.m.
American said the flight was scheduled to be mostly full and that
airline President Robert Isom would be among the passengers.
The daily round-trip flights between Miami and New York are the
start of American's plans to gradually add the MAX back into
service. An American spokeswoman said the airline has begun
announcing aircraft types during boarding to make sure passengers
are aware they will be flying on a MAX. American will also alert
passengers if they're suddenly scheduled to fly on a MAX due to a
schedule change, she said.
David Seymour, American's chief operating officer, said
gradually reintroducing the MAX would help build passenger
confidence and give passengers flexibility if they initially prefer
to fly on other aircraft. He said in an interview earlier this
month that American pilots and flight attendants are confident of
the plane's safety.
"We would have never brought the aircraft back if they were not
comfortable," he said.
The Federal Aviation Administration and global regulators banned
the MAX from passenger flights in March 2019 following two crashes
in less than five months that together took 346 lives. The FAA
lifted its flight ban last month when it approved a series of
software, hardware and training changes for the jets.
Brazil's GOL Linhas Aereas Inteligentes SA was the first airline
in the world to resume MAX passenger service earlier this
month.
United Airlines Holdings Inc. said it plans to reintroduce MAX
flights on Feb. 11 out of hubs in Denver and Houston. Southwest
Airlines Co., which operates an all-737 fleet, is planning to
resume flying passengers on the MAX in March. A spokeswoman said
Southwest hadn't yet officially scheduled flights with the
aircraft.
Investigators looking at the MAX crashes in Indonesia and
Ethiopia largely blamed a new flight-control system known as MCAS
for pushing the planes into fatal nosedives. While the MAX was
grounded, Boeing and regulators devised fixes to the system that
added multiple safeguards aimed at preventing it from overpowering
pilots.
Chicago-based Boeing also formulated new pilot training and
revisions to flight manuals, which had previously excluded
information about the flight-control system. Airline pilots must
complete the training, which requires time in a flight simulator,
before flying the MAX.
--Alison Sider contributed to this article.
Write to Andrew Tangel at Andrew.Tangel@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 29, 2020 10:07 ET (15:07 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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