FAA increasing oversight of Boeing 737 Max manufacturing
In light of recent Boeing (BA) 737 Max 9 incidents and safety concerns, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is stepping up oversight on compliance with safety and quality standards. The regulator announced plans to closely audit the manufacturing and production processes for the 737 Max models.
Yahoo Finance's Pras Subramanian breaks down the details.
For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Yahoo Finance Live.
Editor's note: This article was written by Angel Smith.
Video Transcript
- Federal Aviation Administration announcing that it will take new actions to increase oversight of the Boeing 737 Max 9 airplane, including an audit of its production and manufacturing. And let's bring in now Yahoo Finance's Pras Subramanian to discuss all the details here. All right. Lay it out for us.
PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: Yeah, Jared. Jared the FAA not messing around here. Remember a few years ago when they took their time grounding the Max after those Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines disasters. Donald Trump went on air and actually grounded the planes on, in front of the cabinet. It was like a thing that never happened before.
So anyway, FAA now saying, you know what, we're seeing a lot of problems here with the 737 Max 9 jet. Martin, Mike Whitaker the FAA chief said that the Max has significant problems and there are other manufacturing problems as well. So what they're going to do now is they're going to have more oversight over these things. So first things first, we're going to audit the assembly lines and make sure BA or Boeing is compliant with these approved quality procedures.
We're going to monitor in-service events, meaning when the plane is actually in the air, they're going to monitor those flights and give them more scrutiny. And finally, they're going to see this quality checks and things like that are overseen on post any issue. In fact, including if third parties might be involved to actually make sure this happens. So these are some big steps here that FAA is going to do. And also Boeing, going to play ball here. Saying that, quote, "We welcome the FAA's announcement, and we'll cooperate fully and transparently with our regulator."
- And Pras, just to bring it back to investors who are watching right now as well. How important is the Max 9 to Boeing?
PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: We're looking at their delivery numbers in Q4 and over almost 80% of their orders were 737 Max's, right? So this is a big, this is their big moneymaker, their volume jet. This is the thing that investors are betting on for the company as a future growth driver because right now they're behind Airbus. Airbus the A320 is taking over the game in terms of that single aisle narrow body jet. And this is a problem for Boeing, and they need to actually get the Max back online here, and this is not helping them at all.
- No chance, another headache. Pras, thanks so much for that insight. I appreciate it.