The US Federal Aviation Administration has indefinitely extended the grounded status of Boeing 737-9 Max aircraft given the more stringent requirements it put forward after an Alaska Airlines flight suffered a window blowout shortly after take-off last week.
The regulator has required the US plane maker, one of the world’s biggest, to provide additional data before the agency approves an “extensive and rigorous inspection and maintenance process for returning 737-9 Max aircraft to service”, it said on Friday.
In addition, the FAA has required 40 aircraft to undergo inspections of their door plugs – a panel fitted in place of an unused emergency exit that may have caused the Alaska accident.
The FAA said that while it is “encouraged” by the “exhaustive nature” of Boeing’s instructions for inspections and maintenance, the agency will not approve the inspection and maintenance process until it reviews data from the initial round of 40 inspections, “in the interest of…