Flight data from the Ethiopian Airlines disaster a week ago suggest “clear similarities” with a crash off Indonesia last October, Ethiopia’s transport minister has said.
Both planes were Boeing 737 Max 8 aircraft.
Last Sunday the Ethiopian Airlines jet crashed after take-off from Addis Ababa, killing all 157 people on board.
Transport Minister Dagmawit Moges told journalists that a preliminary report would be released within 30 days.
“Clear similarities were noted between Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 and Indonesian Lion Air Flight 610, which would be the subject of further study during the investigation,” Ms Dagmawit told journalists on Sunday.
In both cases flight tracking data showed the aircraft’s altitude had fluctuated sharply, as the planes seemed to experience erratic climbs and descents.
Boeing Chairman and CEO Dennis Muilenburg later reaffirmed that the company was supporting the investigation.
In a statement, he added that Boeing was going ahead with a software update that will address the behaviour of the flight control system “in response to erroneous sensor inputs”.
What happened in Indonesia?
On 29 October Lion Air Flight 610 crashed after taking off from Jakarta airport, killing 189 people.
Investigators later identified problems with the anti-stall system, which is designed to stop a plane from pointing upwards at too high an angle where it could lose its lift.
During flight JT610, the system repeatedly forced the plane’s nose down, even when the plane was not stalling – possibly due to a faulty sensor.
Pilots tried to correct this by pointing the nose higher, until the system pushed it down again. This happened more than 20 times.
Following the second crash, airlines around the world grounded their Boeing 737 Max 8 aircraft. (BBC)
