The head of the Federal Aviation Administration said a software problem will delay its certification of the Boeing 737 Max 10 as the agency assesses whether it poses a safety issue, a potential setback for the manufacturer as it seeks to complete government approval of its best-selling family of aircraft.
Boeing had expected to receive a green light from its regulator on the years-delayed planes “very soon,” CEO Kelly Ortberg told investors earlier this month. But Boeing said Saturday that last month it flagged a software glitch on some 737 Max aircraft that could affect certain landing procedures.
“We haven’t concluded whether this is a safety-of-flight issue or not, but we will be delaying the 10 … until we’re satisfied that we don’t have an issue here,” FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford said at a press conference on air traffic modernization in Washington, D.C., on Monday.
The FAA said in a statement that “safety dictates the certification timeline.” It added that the agency was “following our safety review process to investigate this software glitch and won’t hesitate to take action if needed.”
Boeing shares extended earlier losses after Bedford’s comments, shedding nearly 7% Monday, as investors assessed another delay after years of setbacks for the aircraft.
“We continue to follow the lead of the FAA as we work through the certification process,” Boeing said in a statement.
Boeing said over the weekend that the issue could occur with a vertical navigation system after an aircraft misses an approach and has to go around and line up to land again, such as in situations when there is an obstruction on the runway, for example. Both the company and Bedford said pilots are trained for those circumstances.
“The pilots remain in control of the airliner, train for these scenarios,” Bedford said Monday. “The issue that we’re looking at right now is the workload component.”
The FAA certified the Max 7, the smallest of the family, last month. Those planes have the most updated version of the software, which the FAA is evaluating. It isn’t clear how that could affect deliveries of those planes to customers like Southwest Airlines.
U.S. airlines said they don’t have any Max aircraft with the issue, in part because they are allowed to revert to older software on those models, if needed, not the newer version that has the potential issue.
Bedford said Boeing had fixed a previous bug in the system but “unexpectedly … introduced a new bug.”
Boeing has been trying to move on from years of safety crises, including two crashes of the Max 8 in 2018 and 2019. A flight control system was implicated in those crashes.
Bedford added on Monday that unlike that system, this “doesn’t take control away from the pilots.”
The company had originally planned to start delivering the Max 10 in 2020 before those safety concerns and other problems delayed the plane. It is the last of the Max family waiting to be certified.
