{ "schema_version": "0.4", "id": "REG-0009", "title": "Boeing 737 MAX MCAS: a flight-control function acts on a single sensor, repeatedly and without pilot command; Lion Air 610 (29 Oct 2018) and Ethiopian 302 (10 Mar 2019)", "batch": "B1", "family": "physical", "context": { "domain": "Aviation automation (a control function acting without pilot command)", "autonomy_level": "supervised", "actor_type": "Physical: Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System on the 737 MAX", "actors": { "count": 1, "text": "1 system per aircraft", "roles": [ "defender" ] }, "mandate_context": "production", "jurisdiction": [ "United States (FAA, Congress, DOJ)", "Indonesia and Ethiopia (accident investigations)" ], "autonomy_level_text": "Machine acts without pilot command, moving the stabilizer against the pilot's pull on the control column; the human supervises and can stop it with the trim switches or cut off its power", "mandate_context_text": "Production; MCAS was not disclosed to pilots before the first crash and was described to operators only after it" }, "provenance_tier": "public_regulatory", "status": "confirmed", "fields": [ { "layer": "Mandate", "facet": "principal", "value": "Boeing, as designer; the operating airlines as principals in service", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "HOUSE" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Mandate", "facet": "objective", "value": "Compensate for pitch-up handling at high angle of attack, consistent with the program's directive to avoid pilot simulator training requirements", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "HOUSE", "KNKT" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Mandate", "facet": "disclosed to supervisor", "value": "Boeing, with FAA approval, removed references to MCAS from the flight crew operations manual and training materials; pilots were largely unaware of it. The deferred prosecution agreement records that two Boeing technical pilots deceived the FAA group that set pilot training requirements about MCAS, while others at Boeing disclosed its expanded scope to the FAA staff who assessed airworthiness. After the Lion Air crash, a Boeing bulletin (6 November 2018) and an FAA emergency airworthiness directive (7 November) warned of repeated nose-down trim from an erroneous angle-of-attack reading without naming MCAS, and on 10 November 2018 Boeing described MCAS in a message to airlines flying the MAX, including Ethiopian Airlines", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "HOUSE", "DOJ-BA", "ETH-AIB" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Actor", "facet": null, "value": "MCAS, acting through the horizontal stabilizer trim", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "KNKT" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Inputs", "facet": null, "value": "A single angle-of-attack sensor; on both flights the sensor delivered erroneous data", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "KNKT", "ETH-AIB" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Decision", "facet": null, "value": "Repeated activation, commanding nose-down trim each time the erroneous input persisted", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "ETH-AIB" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Envelope", "facet": "authority", "value": "Design authority was increased during development to a larger stabilizer movement than originally assessed (from a maximum of 0.6 to 2.5 degrees of stabilizer movement, in March 2016); activation did not require both sensors to agree", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "HOUSE" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Envelope", "facet": "basis", "value": "Boeing did not reevaluate its single- and multiple-failure assessments of MCAS after the 2016 design changes, as Boeing acknowledged in a December 2018 briefing to the FAA, according to the House committee report", "assertion_type": "assertion", "source_ids": [ "HOUSE" ], "confidence": "medium", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Action", "facet": null, "value": "Repeated nose-down trim inputs the crews could not sustainably counter", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "ETH-AIB" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Outcome", "facet": null, "value": "State: harm. 346 fatalities across two flights (189 on Lion Air 610, 157 on Ethiopian 302). Grounded worldwide from March 2019; in the United States from 13 March 2019 until the FAA rescinded its order on 18 November 2020, conditional on the required fixes; other regulators lifted their groundings later (the European Union Aviation Safety Agency on 27 January 2021). As of June 2026.", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "ETH-AIB", "KNKT", "FAA-RTS", "EASA-RTS" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Evidence", "facet": "pre-action warning", "value": "On the Lion Air flight the day before the crash the same behavior occurred; after an off-duty pilot in the jump seat noted the aircraft was diving, the Captain cut out the stabilizer trim and the crew continued on manual trim; the aircraft flew again", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "KNKT" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Evidence", "facet": "causality", "value": "Both investigations identify MCAS activation on erroneous sensor data as central; the House report adds design, certification and disclosure failures. The US National Transportation Safety Board, which took part in the Ethiopian investigation, agrees on the role of MCAS but disputes parts of the Ethiopian report: it says the report gave crew performance insufficient attention; where the Ethiopian report attributes the sensor malfunction to a production-related electrical failure, the Board found the sensor vane was separated by a foreign object, most likely a bird; and it calls the finding on missing MCAS documentation for crews misleading, because Boeing had given the information to all 737 MAX operators four months before the crash", "assertion_type": "assertion", "source_ids": [ "HOUSE", "KNKT", "ETH-AIB", "NTSB-ET302" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": true }, { "layer": "Recovery", "facet": "automated fallback", "value": "None; the system did not recognize its own input as erroneous", "assertion_type": "interpretation", "source_ids": [ "KNKT" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Recovery", "facet": "technical", "value": "The Ethiopian report records that on ET302 the crew cut out the stabilizer trim after the second MCAS activation; with electric trim off, the first officer said the trim was not working, tried it manually and said 'It is not working' at about 340 knots, and the two pilots held 80 to 110 lb on the control column, the nose rising only when both pulled. About two and a half minutes later the crew returned the cutout switches to normal; about five seconds after their next electric trim input a fourth activation moved the stabilizer from 2.3 to 1 unit, and the nose kept dropping despite up to 180 lb of column force", "assertion_type": "assertion", "source_ids": [ "ETH-AIB" ], "confidence": "medium", "disputed": false }, { "layer": "Recovery", "facet": "accountability", "value": "Deferred prosecution agreement with the Department of Justice, January 2021, on a charge of conspiracy to defraud the United States over MCAS: $243.6 million criminal penalty, $1.77 billion to airline customers, and a $500 million fund for the families of those killed (about $2.5 billion in total). On 14 May 2024 the Department told the court it had determined that Boeing breached the agreement by failing to design, implement and enforce a compliance and ethics program. On 5 December 2024 the court rejected a plea agreement the parties had submitted in July 2024. Under a non-prosecution agreement of 29 May 2025, Boeing admitted the facts amounted to conspiracy to defraud the United States by obstructing the FAA's Aircraft Evaluation Group, and agreed to pay a further $243.6 million penalty, $444.5 million for the victims' families and at least $455 million for compliance and safety programs. On 6 November 2025 the court dismissed the charge at the Department's request, while writing that the agreement 'fails to secure the necessary accountability to ensure the safety of the flying public'; the federal appeals court denied the families' petitions against the agreement and the dismissal (revised opinion, 22 May 2026). Civil suits by the families are not recorded here", "assertion_type": "fact", "source_ids": [ "DOJ-BA", "DOJ-BREACH", "DOJ-NPA", "DISMISSAL", "CA5-2026" ], "confidence": "high", "disputed": false } ], "controls": { "failed": [ { "id": "C-E6", "note": "Authority limits", "confidence": "high", "basis": "curated" }, { "id": "C-M1", "note": "Disclosure to operators", "confidence": "high", "basis": "curated" }, { "id": "C-I2", "note": "Single-sensor dependence; Sensor disagreement check gating activation (absent)", "confidence": "high", "basis": "curated" }, { "id": "C-O2", "note": "Certification of MCAS (the House committee report identifies certification failures)", "confidence": "medium", "basis": "curated" }, { "id": "C-R3", "note": "Crew recovery on the Lion Air flight the day before: after a jump-seat pilot noted the dive, the Captain cut out the stabilizer trim (one occurrence). On Ethiopian 302 the crew also cut out the trim, could not trim manually, and returned the switches to normal about two and a half minutes later, before the fourth activation", "confidence": "high", "basis": "curated" } ], "succeeded": [], "absent": [ { "id": "C-X1", "note": "No limit on repeated activations: MCAS commanded another nose-down input whenever the high reading persisted five seconds after a pilot trim input; each input was limited to 2.5 degrees of stabilizer movement", "confidence": "medium", "basis": "curated" } ] }, "applicable_rules": [ "FAA certification rules (Part 25)", "Deferred prosecution agreement terms (2021), then non-prosecution agreement terms (2025)" ], "unmapped": [ "Assurance before action: the safety assessment that should have reflected the final design did not", "Pre-action warning available to the principal: the prior flight's recovery" ], "corrections": [ { "date": "2026-10-06", "field": "readout:accountability", "old": "accountability reached the operator", "new": "accountability reached the maker of the automation (deferred prosecution agreement against Boeing)", "reason": "Boeing is the manufacturer, not the operator; corrected in the 26-case readout" }, { "date": "2026-10-13", "field": "controls.C-I2", "old": "failed: Single-sensor dependence; absent: Sensor disagreement check gating activation", "new": "failed: Single-sensor dependence; Sensor disagreement check gating activation (absent)", "reason": "a control has one state per case; entries in two states merged into the state the record supports" }, { "date": "2026-10-13", "field": "fields and sources", "old": "House report typed as regulator; 'safety assessment did not reflect final design'; runaway-stabilizer sufficiency claim; grounding dates unsourced; 'later criminal proceedings'", "new": "House majority-staff report typed as public record; reworded to 'did not reevaluate MCAS after the redesign'; recovery claim reworded to what the Ethiopian report records; grounding end cited to the FAA rescission; DOJ agreement terms from the agreement itself, later proceedings removed pending their own sources", "reason": "claims aligned to what each linked record says, found on review" }, { "date": "2026-10-13", "field": "fields", "old": "third pilot credited with the recovery; 'pilots did not know it existed'; 'did not reevaluate MCAS'; grounding stated as global; objective 'handled like earlier 737s'", "new": "Captain cut out the trim after the jump-seat pilot's observation; House report wording ('largely unaware', failure assessments not reevaluated); US grounding dates; objective as the House report frames it; 2024 breach finding noted", "reason": "independent check against the linked records before right-of-reply letters" }, { "date": "2026-10-14", "field": "reviewed_by", "old": "none", "new": "Saurabh Bhatnagar (editor)", "reason": "case checked by the editor against its linked records" }, { "date": "2026-10-14", "field": "controls.C-R3", "old": "Third pilot's intervention the day before Lion Air 610 (one occurrence)", "new": "Crew recovery on the Lion Air flight the day before: after a jump-seat pilot noted the dive, the Captain cut out the stabilizer trim (one occurrence)", "reason": "the Indonesian report credits the Captain with the recovery; aligns the control note with the corrected claim" }, { "date": "2026-10-14", "field": "named_parties[Boeing].right_of_reply", "old": "{\"offered\": null, \"response\": null}", "new": "{\"offered\": \"2026-10-14\", \"response\": null}", "reason": "right of reply offered by email from register@secureautonomous.com to media@boeing.com on 14 October 2026 (confirmed in the Sent folder); recorded at the editor's instruction" }, { "date": "2026-10-14", "field": "controls", "old": "failed candidate 'Certification safety assessment'", "new": "C-O2 (failed), medium confidence", "reason": "editor decision 14 October 2026: new canonical control C-O2 (independent assurance before deployment) added for this gap" }, { "date": "2026-10-16", "field": "inference.value", "old": "This is the clearest case in the Register of a mandate the supervisor could not have fulfilled because it was never told the mandate existed; the agent-world analogue is an operator who does not know what the agent is permitted to do", "new": "The clearest case in the Register of supervisors who could not do the job because no one told them what the system was permitted to do. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who does not know what the agent is allowed to do.", "reason": "Reworded for readers before the editor's sign-off, after an outside review found it read as internal notes; the interpretation itself is unchanged" }, { "date": "2026-10-16", "field": "outcome.as_of", "old": "2022", "new": "2024", "reason": "Found in an outside review of the published record on 16 October 2026: the record includes a 2024 finding, so the outcome is current as of 2024" }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "title", "old": "Boeing 737 MAX MCAS: a flight-control function acts on a single sensor with authority to override pilots; Lion Air 610 (29 Oct 2018) and Ethiopian 302 (10 Mar 2019)", "new": "Boeing 737 MAX MCAS: a flight-control function acts on a single sensor, repeatedly and without pilot command; Lion Air 610 (29 Oct 2018) and Ethiopian 302 (10 Mar 2019)", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: 'with authority to override pilots' overstates the record. The House committee report describes MCAS's 'potential effect on aircraft handling without pilot command', and the Ethiopian report records repeated activations, but also that 'any main electric trim input would immediately override any MCAS command' and that with a cutout switch at CUTOUT 'neither main electric trim nor automatic trim can move the stabilizer'." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "context.autonomy_level_text", "old": "Machine acts, human supervises, with the machine able to override the human", "new": "Machine acts without pilot command, moving the stabilizer against the pilot's pull on the control column; the human supervises and can stop it with the trim switches or cut off its power", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the Ethiopian report (section 1.6.5) says the column cutout was inhibited while MCAS was active, 'allowing Airplane nose-down stabilizer motion with Airplane nose-up column input', but that the pilots' electric trim switches override MCAS and the stabilizer trim cutout switches remove its power; 'able to override the human' overstated it." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "context.mandate_context_text", "old": "Production; mandate not disclosed to the supervising humans", "new": "Production; MCAS was not disclosed to pilots before the first crash and was described to operators only after it", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: true for the Lion Air crash (House report: pilots 'were precluded from knowing of the existence of MCAS'), but the Ethiopian report records that after the Lion Air accident 'the manufacturer revealed this feature of the pitch trim system as MCAS, and provided description of it to operators, including Ethiopian Airlines'; the House report dates that message 10 November 2018." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "outcome.cost", "old": "~$2.5B DPA; global grounding", "new": "about $2.5 billion under the 2021 deferred prosecution agreement and over $1.1 billion more under the 2025 non-prosecution agreement; worldwide grounding from March 2019", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the 2021 agreement's total is $2,513,600,000 (agreement, paragraph 7); the non-prosecution agreement of 29 May 2025 adds a remaining $243.6 million penalty, $444.5 million for victims' families and at least $455 million for compliance and safety programs (over $1.1 billion, per the Government's status report of 23 May 2025). 'Global grounding' had no linked source; the European Union Aviation Safety Agency states the aircraft 'was grounded worldwide in March 2019'. Abbreviation spelled out." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "outcome.regime_consequence", "old": "deferred prosecution agreement; grounding", "new": "deferred prosecution agreement (2021), found breached by the Department of Justice (2024); non-prosecution agreement and dismissal of the charge (2025); families' petitions against them denied on appeal (2026); grounding", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: out of date. The Department told the court on 14 May 2024 that Boeing breached the agreement (ECF No. 199); the court dismissed the charge on 6 November 2025 after a non-prosecution agreement (ECF No. 358); the Fifth Circuit denied the families' mandamus petitions (revised opinion, 22 May 2026)." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "outcome.as_of", "old": "2024", "new": "Jun 2026", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the latest development found is the Fifth Circuit's revised opinion of 22 May 2026, with the mandate issued 18 June 2026 (Department of Justice case page); the Outcome field said 'As of 2022' and the block said 2024, so both now read June 2026." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "applicable_rules", "old": "[\"FAA certification rules (Part 25)\", \"Deferred prosecution terms\"]", "new": "[\"FAA certification rules (Part 25)\", \"Deferred prosecution agreement terms (2021), then non-prosecution agreement terms (2025)\"]", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the deferred prosecution agreement was found breached in 2024 and replaced by the non-prosecution agreement of 29 May 2025, under which the charge was dismissed (ECF No. 358)." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "fields.Mandate objective.source_ids", "old": "[\"HOUSE\"]", "new": "[\"HOUSE\", \"KNKT\"]", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the Indonesian report (section 2.5.1.1) states the purpose in one sentence: 'The MCAS was needed in order to make the Boeing 737-8 (MAX) handling characteristics so similar to the NG versions that no simulator training was needed for type rating.' Added as a second source; the House wording holds." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "fields.Mandate disclosed to supervisor", "old": "{\"value\": \"Boeing, with FAA approval, removed references to MCAS from the flight crew operations manual and training materials; pilots were largely unaware of it\", \"source_ids\": [\"HOUSE\"]}", "new": "{\"value\": \"Boeing, with FAA approval, removed references to MCAS from the flight crew operations manual and training materials; pilots were largely unaware of it. The deferred prosecution agreement records that two Boeing technical pilots deceived the FAA group that set pilot training requirements about MCAS, while others at Boeing disclosed its expanded scope to the FAA staff who assessed airworthiness. After the Lion Air crash, a Boeing bulletin (6 November 2018) and an FAA emergency airworthiness directive (7 November) warned of repeated nose-down trim from an erroneous angle-of-attack reading without naming MCAS, and on 10 November 2018 Boeing described MCAS in a message to airlines flying the MAX, including Ethiopian Airlines\", \"source_ids\": [\"HOUSE\", \"DOJ-BA\", \"ETH-AIB\"]}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the field held for the period before the first crash but omitted two things the primary records show. The deferred prosecution agreement (paragraph 1(h), Statement of Facts paragraph 25) says 'two of the Company's 737 MAX Flight Technical Pilots deceived the FAA AEG about MCAS' while 'others in the Company disclosed MCAS's expanded operational scope' to the FAA airworthiness staff. The House report and the Ethiopian report record the 6-7 November 2018 bulletin and emergency directive, which did not mention MCAS, and Boeing's 10 November 2018 message describing MCAS to operators, including Ethiopian Airlines." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "fields.Envelope authority", "old": "Design authority was increased during development to a larger stabilizer movement than originally assessed; activation did not require both sensors to agree", "new": "Design authority was increased during development to a larger stabilizer movement than originally assessed (from a maximum of 0.6 to 2.5 degrees of stabilizer movement, in March 2016); activation did not require both sensors to agree", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the House report (p. 102) gives the figures: 'As originally designed, MCAS was only capable of moving the horizontal stabilizer a maximum of 0.6 degrees' and, after the March 2016 redesign, 'a maximum of 2.5 degrees'. Added for precision; the claim holds." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "fields.Envelope basis", "old": "Boeing did not reevaluate its single- and multiple-failure assessments of MCAS after the 2016 design changes", "new": "Boeing did not reevaluate its single- and multiple-failure assessments of MCAS after the 2016 design changes, as Boeing acknowledged in a December 2018 briefing to the FAA, according to the House committee report", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: an assertion must name who asserts it. The House report (p. 27-28) says that in a December 2018 briefing to the FAA 'Boeing also acknowledged that it did not reevaluate its single- and multiple-failure assessments of MCAS after its engineers made design changes to the MCAS software in 2016.' Type and confidence unchanged." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "fields.Outcome", "old": "{\"value\": \"State: harm. 346 fatalities across two flights (189 on Lion Air 610, 157 on Ethiopian 302). Grounded in the United States from 13 March 2019 until the FAA rescinded its order on 18 November 2020, conditional on the required fixes; other regulators lifted their groundings later. As of 2022.\", \"source_ids\": [\"ETH-AIB\", \"KNKT\", \"FAA-RTS\"]}", "new": "{\"value\": \"State: harm. 346 fatalities across two flights (189 on Lion Air 610, 157 on Ethiopian 302). Grounded worldwide from March 2019; in the United States from 13 March 2019 until the FAA rescinded its order on 18 November 2020, conditional on the required fixes; other regulators lifted their groundings later (the European Union Aviation Safety Agency on 27 January 2021). As of June 2026.\", \"source_ids\": [\"ETH-AIB\", \"KNKT\", \"FAA-RTS\", \"EASA-RTS\"]}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: 'other regulators lifted their groundings later' had no linked source; the European Union Aviation Safety Agency's release of 27 January 2021 states the aircraft 'was grounded worldwide in March 2019' and approves its return to service in Europe. 'As of 2022' disagreed with outcome.as_of; both now June 2026." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "fields.Evidence causality", "old": "{\"value\": \"Both investigations identify MCAS activation on erroneous sensor data as central; the House report adds design, certification and disclosure failures\", \"source_ids\": [\"HOUSE\", \"KNKT\", \"ETH-AIB\"], \"disputed\": false}", "new": "{\"value\": \"Both investigations identify MCAS activation on erroneous sensor data as central; the House report adds design, certification and disclosure failures. The US National Transportation Safety Board, which took part in the Ethiopian investigation, agrees on the role of MCAS but disputes parts of the Ethiopian report: it says the report gave crew performance insufficient attention; where the Ethiopian report attributes the sensor malfunction to a production-related electrical failure, the Board found the sensor vane was separated by a foreign object, most likely a bird; and it calls the finding on missing MCAS documentation for crews misleading, because Boeing had given the information to all 737 MAX operators four months before the crash\", \"source_ids\": [\"HOUSE\", \"KNKT\", \"ETH-AIB\", \"NTSB-ET302\"], \"disputed\": true}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the National Transportation Safety Board's release of 24 January 2023 says it 'agrees with the overall finding in the EAIB report related to the role' of MCAS, but that the report 'contains findings the NTSB said are unsupported by evidence', naming the electrical cause of the sensor failure (the Board found 'impact with a foreign object, which was most likely a bird') and calling the documentation finding 'misleading'; it also refers to its 27 December 2022 comments on 'insufficient attention to the human performance aspects'. The Ethiopian report (finding 65) attributes the malfunction to a 'production related intermittent electrical/electronic failure'. Both accounts stated; marked disputed." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "fields.Recovery technical", "old": "The crews' attempts to counter the trim failed: on ET302 the first officer reported the manual trim was not working, and control-column forces of 80 to 110 lb did not stop the nose dropping", "new": "The Ethiopian report records that on ET302 the crew cut out the stabilizer trim after the second MCAS activation; with electric trim off, the first officer said the trim was not working, tried it manually and said 'It is not working' at about 340 knots, and the two pilots held 80 to 110 lb on the control column, the nose rising only when both pulled. About two and a half minutes later the crew returned the cutout switches to normal; about five seconds after their next electric trim input a fourth activation moved the stabilizer from 2.3 to 1 unit, and the nose kept dropping despite up to 180 lb of column force", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the field compressed two phases and left out the decisive step. The Ethiopian report's history of flight (phases 3 to 5) records the cutout at about 05:40:38; that 'Pitch increased when both pilots applied forces, pitch decreased when a single pilot applied force (force oscillated between 80 lbs and 110lbs)'; the switches 'restored to the normal position' by 05:43:11; a 4th MCAS activation in which 'The stabilizer moved from 2.3 to 1 unit'; and 'despite calculated force of up to 180lbs, the pitch continued decreasing'. Now attributed to the Ethiopian report; type and confidence unchanged." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "fields.Recovery accountability", "old": "{\"value\": \"Deferred prosecution agreement with the Department of Justice, January 2021, on a charge of conspiracy to defraud the United States over MCAS: $243.6 million criminal penalty, $1.77 billion to airline customers, and a $500 million fund for the families of those killed (about $2.5 billion in total). In 2024 the Department of Justice found Boeing had breached the agreement; later proceedings are not recorded here\", \"source_ids\": [\"DOJ-BA\"]}", "new": "{\"value\": \"Deferred prosecution agreement with the Department of Justice, January 2021, on a charge of conspiracy to defraud the United States over MCAS: $243.6 million criminal penalty, $1.77 billion to airline customers, and a $500 million fund for the families of those killed (about $2.5 billion in total). On 14 May 2024 the Department told the court it had determined that Boeing breached the agreement by failing to design, implement and enforce a compliance and ethics program. On 5 December 2024 the court rejected a plea agreement the parties had submitted in July 2024. Under a non-prosecution agreement of 29 May 2025, Boeing admitted the facts amounted to conspiracy to defraud the United States by obstructing the FAA's Aircraft Evaluation Group, and agreed to pay a further $243.6 million penalty, $444.5 million for the victims' families and at least $455 million for compliance and safety programs. On 6 November 2025 the court dismissed the charge at the Department's request, while writing that the agreement 'fails to secure the necessary accountability to ensure the safety of the flying public'; the federal appeals court denied the families' petitions against the agreement and the dismissal (revised opinion, 22 May 2026). Civil suits by the families are not recorded here\", \"source_ids\": [\"DOJ-BA\", \"DOJ-BREACH\", \"DOJ-NPA\", \"DISMISSAL\", \"CA5-2026\"]}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the 2024 breach finding was cited to the 2021 agreement, which cannot contain it, and the field stopped there. Primary records now cited: the Department's letter to the court of 14 May 2024 (ECF No. 199); the non-prosecution agreement of 29 May 2025 (paragraphs 3, 4 and 11); the court's order of 6 November 2025 (ECF No. 358), which also records the July 2024 plea agreement and its rejection on 5 December 2024; and the Fifth Circuit's revised opinion of 22 May 2026 denying the families' mandamus petitions." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "controls.C-X1", "old": "Activation limit per flight", "new": "No limit on repeated activations: MCAS commanded another nose-down input whenever the high reading persisted five seconds after a pilot trim input; each input was limited to 2.5 degrees of stabilizer movement", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the Ethiopian report says that if the elevated angle of attack persists for more than five seconds after a main electric trim input 'the MCAS flight control law will command another stabilizer nose down trim input'; the Indonesian report gives the 2.5 degree limit and says 'Boeing also not considered repetitive erroneous MCAS activations'. A magnitude limit existed; a limit on repetition did not. Bucket and confidence unchanged." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "controls.C-R3", "old": "Crew recovery on the Lion Air flight the day before: after a jump-seat pilot noted the dive, the Captain cut out the stabilizer trim (one occurrence)", "new": "Crew recovery on the Lion Air flight the day before: after a jump-seat pilot noted the dive, the Captain cut out the stabilizer trim (one occurrence). On Ethiopian 302 the crew also cut out the trim, could not trim manually, and returned the switches to normal about two and a half minutes later, before the fourth activation", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the Ethiopian report's history of flight (phases 4 and 5) records that the ET302 crew also used the cutout switches, reported the trim 'not working', and restored the switches before the fourth MCAS activation; the note now records both flights. Bucket and confidence unchanged (the bucket is the editor's pending call)." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "inference.value", "old": "{\"value\": \"The clearest case in the Register of supervisors who could not do the job because no one told them what the system was permitted to do. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who does not know what the agent is allowed to do.\", \"source_ids\": [\"HOUSE\"]}", "new": "{\"value\": \"Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising MCAS, the automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: the US National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.\", \"source_ids\": [\"HOUSE\", \"KNKT\", \"ETH-AIB\", \"NTSB-ET302\"]}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the interpretation held for Lion Air 610 (House report; Indonesian contributing factor 4: 'The absence of guidance on MCAS ... made it more difficult for flight crews to properly respond') but overreached for the case as a whole. The Indonesian report records the previous flight's crew recovering with the cutout switches; the Ethiopian report says the post-crash bulletin and directive were distributed to all the operator's MAX pilots and 'did not have the intended effect' (contributing factor 2); and the National Transportation Safety Board calls the documentation finding 'misleading'. The unchecked superlative ('The clearest case in the Register') is removed. The interpretation was already unsigned; the editor must sign the new wording." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "sources.DOJ-BREACH", "old": null, "new": "{\"title\": \"Department of Justice letter to Judge Reed O'Connor on Boeing's breach of the deferred prosecution agreement, United States v. The Boeing Company, No. 4:21-cr-00005-O (N.D. Tex.), ECF No. 199\", \"type\": \"court\", \"url\": \"https://static.maglaw.com/docs/Boeing%20Docket%20%23199.pdf\", \"via_press\": false, \"date\": \"2024-05-14\", \"tier\": \"public_regulatory\", \"interest\": null, \"primary\": true, \"checked\": \"2026-10-20\"}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the court filing of 14 May 2024 (a copy of docket entry 199 hosted by a law firm) records the Department's breach determination: 'the Government has determined that Boeing breached its obligations under' the agreement 'by failing to design, implement, and enforce a compliance and ethics program'. It is the primary record for the 2024 breach finding, which the 2021 agreement could not contain." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "sources.DOJ-NPA", "old": null, "new": "{\"title\": \"Non-Prosecution Agreement, United States v. The Boeing Company, No. 4:21-cr-00005-O (N.D. Tex.), 29 May 2025\", \"type\": \"court\", \"url\": \"https://www.justice.gov/criminal/media/1402426/dl?inline\", \"via_press\": false, \"date\": \"2025-05-29\", \"tier\": \"public_regulatory\", \"interest\": null, \"primary\": true, \"checked\": \"2026-10-20\"}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the non-prosecution agreement of 29 May 2025, published by the Department of Justice, sets the later terms: a remaining criminal penalty of $243,600,000, $444.5 million in further victim compensation, at least $455,000,000 for compliance and safety programs, and Boeing's admission that the facts 'constitute a violation of law, specifically Title 18, United States Code, Section 371'." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "sources.DISMISSAL", "old": null, "new": "{\"title\": \"Memorandum Opinion and Order granting the Government's motion to dismiss the Information, United States v. The Boeing Company, No. 4:21-cr-5-O (N.D. Tex.), ECF No. 358\", \"type\": \"court\", \"url\": \"https://www.justice.gov/criminal/media/1417031/dl?inline\", \"via_press\": false, \"date\": \"2025-11-06\", \"tier\": \"public_regulatory\", \"interest\": null, \"primary\": true, \"checked\": \"2026-10-20\"}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the court's order of 6 November 2025 records the sequence (breach notice of 14 May 2024, plea agreement submitted July 2024 and rejected 5 December 2024, non-prosecution agreement) and grants the motion to dismiss, while finding 'this agreement fails to secure the necessary accountability to ensure the safety of the flying public'." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "sources.CA5-2026", "old": null, "new": "{\"title\": \"In re Naoise Connolly Ryan, et al., Nos. 25-11253 and 25-11254 (5th Cir.), revised opinion on petitions for rehearing, 22 May 2026\", \"type\": \"court\", \"url\": \"https://www.justice.gov/criminal/media/1454141/dl?inline\", \"via_press\": false, \"date\": \"2026-05-22\", \"tier\": \"public_regulatory\", \"interest\": null, \"primary\": true, \"checked\": \"2026-10-20\"}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the Fifth Circuit's revised opinion of 22 May 2026 denies rehearing and the families' mandamus petitions against the non-prosecution agreement and the dismissal ('we DENY the petitions for writ of mandamus'); the Department of Justice case page records the mandate issued 18 June 2026." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "sources.EASA-RTS", "old": null, "new": "{\"title\": \"EASA declares Boeing 737 MAX safe to return to service in Europe\", \"type\": \"regulator\", \"url\": \"https://www.easa.europa.eu/en/newsroom-and-events/press-releases/easa-declares-boeing-737-max-safe-return-service-europe\", \"via_press\": false, \"date\": \"2021-01-27\", \"tier\": \"public_regulatory\", \"interest\": null, \"primary\": true, \"checked\": \"2026-10-20\"}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the European Union Aviation Safety Agency's press release of 27 January 2021 states 'The Boeing 737 MAX was grounded worldwide in March 2019' and approves its return to service in Europe; no linked record supported the worldwide grounding or the later lifting by other regulators." }, { "date": "2026-10-20", "field": "sources.NTSB-ET302", "old": null, "new": "{\"title\": \"NTSB Publishes Additional Comments on Ethiopia's Final Report on 737 MAX 8 Accident\", \"type\": \"regulator\", \"url\": \"https://www.ntsb.gov/news/press-releases/Pages/NR20230124.aspx\", \"via_press\": false, \"date\": \"2023-01-24\", \"tier\": \"public_regulatory\", \"interest\": \"accredited representative of the state where the aircraft was designed and built\", \"primary\": true, \"checked\": \"2026-10-20\"}", "reason": "Found in the editor's source re-check of 19-20 October 2026: the US National Transportation Safety Board's release of 24 January 2023 agrees with the Ethiopian report on the role of MCAS but disputes several of its findings (crew performance, the cause of the sensor failure, missing MCAS documentation); the case did not record the dispute." }, { "date": "2026-10-21", "field": "controls.C-R3", "old": "succeeded", "new": "failed", "reason": "Editor's classification call of 21 October 2026 (call 4, accepted from pull request #74): on neither crash flight did the crew's takeover recover the aircraft; the day-before recovery on the Lion Air aircraft stays in the note." }, { "date": "2026-10-21", "field": "inference.value", "old": "Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising MCAS, the automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: the US National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.", "new": "Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), an automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: the US National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.", "reason": "Found in the editor's second, independent check of the interpretations, 21 October 2026: abbreviation spelled out at first use (House committee report)." }, { "date": "2026-10-21", "field": "sources.CVRA-2022", "old": null, "new": "{\"title\": \"Second Memorandum Opinion and Order (Crime Victims' Rights Act), United States v. The Boeing Company, No. 4:21-cr-5-O (N.D. Tex.), 21 October 2022, ECF No. 116\", \"type\": \"court\", \"url\": \"https://www.justice.gov/media/1329401/dl?inline\", \"date\": \"2022-10-21\", \"tier\": \"public_regulatory\", \"interest\": null, \"primary\": true, \"checked\": \"2026-10-21\", \"via_press\": false}", "reason": "Found in the editor's second, independent check of the interpretations, 21 October 2026: the court found, after an evidentiary hearing, that 'without Boeing's fraud the crashes would not have occurred' and that had Boeing not concealed MCAS from the FAA's training evaluators 'neither crash would have occurred'; the interpretation gave only the view that discounts disclosure." }, { "date": "2026-10-21", "field": "inference.value", "old": "Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), an automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: the US National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.", "new": "Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), an automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: a federal court found in October 2022, in ruling that the families had rights as crime victims, that had Boeing not concealed MCAS from the Federal Aviation Administration's evaluators neither crash would have occurred, while the US National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.", "reason": "Found in the editor's second, independent check of the interpretations, 21 October 2026: the paragraph gave only the side that discounts disclosure; the court's finding (ECF No. 116, 21 October 2022, PDF pages 11 and 14) points the other way, so both are stated." }, { "date": "2026-10-21", "field": "inference.signed_by", "old": "Saurabh Bhatnagar", "new": null, "reason": "The interpretation's wording changed after the editor signed it (second, independent check of 21 October 2026); the signature is cleared so the editor signs the corrected wording." }, { "date": "2026-10-21", "field": "inference.value", "old": "Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), an automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: a federal court found in October 2022, in ruling that the families had rights as crime victims, that had Boeing not concealed MCAS from the Federal Aviation Administration's evaluators neither crash would have occurred, while the US National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.", "new": "Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), an automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: a federal court found in October 2022, in ruling that the families had rights as crime victims, that had Boeing not concealed MCAS from the Federal Aviation Administration's evaluators neither crash would have occurred, while the United States National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.", "reason": "Found in the editor's second, independent check of the interpretations, 21 October 2026: third check: abbreviation spelled out in the signed paragraph." }, { "date": "2026-10-21", "field": "inference.value", "old": "Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), an automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: a federal court found in October 2022, in ruling that the families had rights as crime victims, that had Boeing not concealed MCAS from the Federal Aviation Administration's evaluators neither crash would have occurred, while the United States National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.", "new": "Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), an automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: a federal court found in October 2022, in ruling that the families could assert rights as representatives of crime victims, that had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the Federal Aviation Administration group that set pilot training requirements, neither crash would have occurred, while the United States National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.", "reason": "Found in the editor's second, independent check of the interpretations, 21 October 2026: third check: the court found Boeing concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds, not MCAS itself, from the group that set pilot training, and the families' standing is as representatives of crime victims (ECF No. 116, PDF pages 2 to 4 and 11 to 14)." }, { "date": "2026-10-22", "field": "named_parties[Boeing].right_of_reply", "old": "{\"offered\": \"2026-10-14\", \"response\": null, \"assessed_through\": \"2026-10-22\", \"assessments\": [{\"through\": \"2026-10-22\", \"date\": \"2026-10-22\", \"by\": \"editor's call of 22 October 2026 on the rule 19 review by four independent agents (reports rule19_1 to rule19_4); GitHub (REG-0005) judged borderline and not triggering\", \"triggered\": [\"the federal court's October 2022 finding that, had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the FAA group setting pilot training, neither crash would have occurred (interpretation)\"], \"note\": null}]}", "new": "{\"offered\": \"2026-10-14\", \"response\": null, \"assessed_through\": \"2026-10-22\", \"assessments\": [{\"through\": \"2026-10-22\", \"date\": \"2026-10-22\", \"by\": \"editor's call of 22 October 2026 on the rule 19 review by four independent agents (reports rule19_1 to rule19_4); GitHub (REG-0005) judged borderline and not triggering\", \"triggered\": [\"the federal court's October 2022 finding that, had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the FAA group setting pilot training, neither crash would have occurred (interpretation)\"], \"note\": null}], \"followups\": [{\"sent\": \"2026-10-22\", \"covers\": \"the federal court's October 2022 finding that, had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the FAA group setting pilot training, neither crash would have occurred (interpretation)\"}]}", "reason": "right of reply recorded by a human" }, { "date": "2026-10-28", "field": "named_parties[Boeing].right_of_reply", "old": "{\"offered\": \"2026-10-14\", \"response\": null, \"assessed_through\": \"2026-10-22\", \"assessments\": [{\"through\": \"2026-10-22\", \"date\": \"2026-10-22\", \"by\": \"editor's call of 22 October 2026 on the rule 19 review by four independent agents (reports rule19_1 to rule19_4); GitHub (REG-0005) judged borderline and not triggering\", \"triggered\": [\"the federal court's October 2022 finding that, had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the FAA group setting pilot training, neither crash would have occurred (interpretation)\"], \"note\": null}], \"followups\": [{\"sent\": \"2026-10-22\", \"covers\": \"the federal court's October 2022 finding that, had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the FAA group setting pilot training, neither crash would have occurred (interpretation)\"}]}", "new": "{\"offered\": \"2026-10-14\", \"response\": null, \"assessed_through\": \"2026-10-22\", \"assessments\": [{\"through\": \"2026-10-22\", \"date\": \"2026-10-22\", \"by\": \"editor's call of 22 October 2026 on the rule 19 review by four independent agents (reports rule19_1 to rule19_4); GitHub (REG-0005) judged borderline and not triggering\", \"triggered\": [\"the federal court's October 2022 finding that, had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the FAA group setting pilot training, neither crash would have occurred (interpretation)\"], \"note\": null}], \"followups\": [{\"sent\": \"2026-10-22\", \"covers\": \"the federal court's October 2022 finding that, had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the FAA group setting pilot training, neither crash would have occurred (interpretation)\"}], \"no_response_as_of\": \"2026-10-28\"}", "reason": "right of reply recorded by a human" } ], "created": "2026-10-06", "last_reviewed": "2026-10-28", "actor_status": "confirmed", "provenance_tier_text": "Public and regulatory, court", "status_text": "Confirmed", "outcome": { "state": "harm", "severity": "fatalities", "affected_parties": [ "346 passengers and crew" ], "cost": "about $2.5 billion under the 2021 deferred prosecution agreement and over $1.1 billion more under the 2025 non-prosecution agreement; worldwide grounding from March 2019", "regime_consequence": "deferred prosecution agreement (2021), found breached by the Department of Justice (2024); non-prosecution agreement and dismissal of the charge (2025); families' petitions against them denied on appeal (2026); grounding", "as_of": "Jun 2026", "derived_by": "backfill-curated" }, "inference": { "value": "Before the Lion Air crash, the pilots supervising the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), an automatic nose-down trim function, had not been told it existed: the manufacturer, with the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, removed it from the flight crew manual and training materials, and the Indonesian investigators found the missing guidance made it harder for crews to respond. That is not the whole record. The Lion Air crew the day before recovered without knowing of MCAS by cutting out the stabilizer trim, and the Ethiopian crew had received the bulletin and emergency directive issued after the first crash, which pointed to the cutout switches; the Ethiopian investigators say that guidance did not have its intended effect. Both investigations also list the single sensor, the repeated activations and the many alerts the crews faced at once. The record does not settle how much turned on disclosure: a federal court found in October 2022, in ruling that the families could assert rights as representatives of crime victims, that had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the Federal Aviation Administration group that set pilot training requirements, neither crash would have occurred, while the United States National Transportation Safety Board calls the Ethiopian finding on missing MCAS documentation misleading. The agent-world equivalent is an operator who has not been told what the agent is allowed to do.", "source_ids": [ "HOUSE", "KNKT", "ETH-AIB", "NTSB-ET302", "CVRA-2022" ], "confidence": "high", "signed_by": "Saurabh Bhatnagar", "signed_on": "2026-10-21" }, "named_parties": [ { "name": "Boeing", "right_of_reply": { "offered": "2026-10-14", "response": null, "assessed_through": "2026-10-22", "assessments": [ { "through": "2026-10-22", "date": "2026-10-22", "by": "editor's call of 22 October 2026 on the rule 19 review by four independent agents (reports rule19_1 to rule19_4); GitHub (REG-0005) judged borderline and not triggering", "triggered": [ "the federal court's October 2022 finding that, had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the FAA group setting pilot training, neither crash would have occurred (interpretation)" ], "note": null } ], "followups": [ { "sent": "2026-10-22", "covers": "the federal court's October 2022 finding that, had Boeing not concealed MCAS's expansion to low speeds from the FAA group setting pilot training, neither crash would have occurred (interpretation)" } ], "no_response_as_of": "2026-10-28" } } ], "sources": { "DOJ-BA": { "title": "Deferred Prosecution Agreement, United States v. The Boeing Company, No. 4:21-CR-005-O (N.D. Tex.)", "type": "court", "url": "https://www.justice.gov/criminal/criminal-vns/file/1482911/dl", "via_press": false, "date": "2021-01-07", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-13" }, "ETH-AIB": { "title": "Ethiopian Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau, Final Report No. AI-01/19, ET302 B737-8 MAX ET-AVJ accident of 10 March 2019", "type": "regulator", "url": "https://bea.aero/fileadmin/user_upload/ET_302__B737-8MAX_ACCIDENT_FINAL_REPORT.pdf", "via_press": false, "date": "2022-12-23", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-13" }, "HOUSE": { "title": "House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure (majority staff), Final Committee Report: The Design, Development and Certification of the Boeing 737 MAX", "type": "public_record", "url": "https://democrats-transportation.house.gov/imo/media/doc/final_boeing_737_max_report.pdf", "via_press": false, "date": "2020-09-16", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-13" }, "KNKT": { "title": "Komite Nasional Keselamatan Transportasi (KNKT), Aircraft Accident Investigation Report, PT. Lion Mentari Airlines Boeing 737-8 (MAX) PK-LQP, Tanjung Karawang, West Java, 29 October 2018", "type": "regulator", "url": "https://knkt.go.id/Repo/Files/Laporan/Penerbangan/2018/KNKT.18.10.33.04-Final-Report.pdf", "via_press": false, "date": "2019-10-25", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-13" }, "FAA-RTS": { "title": "FAA, Rescission of the 737 MAX emergency order of prohibition (return to service), 18 November 2020", "type": "regulator", "url": "https://www.faa.gov/sites/faa.gov/files/2022-08/737_MAX_Rescission_of_Grounding_Order.pdf", "via_press": false, "date": "2020-11-18", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-13" }, "DOJ-BREACH": { "title": "Department of Justice letter to Judge Reed O'Connor on Boeing's breach of the deferred prosecution agreement, United States v. The Boeing Company, No. 4:21-cr-00005-O (N.D. Tex.), ECF No. 199", "type": "court", "url": "https://static.maglaw.com/docs/Boeing%20Docket%20%23199.pdf", "via_press": false, "date": "2024-05-14", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-20" }, "DOJ-NPA": { "title": "Non-Prosecution Agreement, United States v. The Boeing Company, No. 4:21-cr-00005-O (N.D. Tex.), 29 May 2025", "type": "court", "url": "https://www.justice.gov/criminal/media/1402426/dl?inline", "via_press": false, "date": "2025-05-29", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-20" }, "DISMISSAL": { "title": "Memorandum Opinion and Order granting the Government's motion to dismiss the Information, United States v. The Boeing Company, No. 4:21-cr-5-O (N.D. Tex.), ECF No. 358", "type": "court", "url": "https://www.justice.gov/criminal/media/1417031/dl?inline", "via_press": false, "date": "2025-11-06", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-20" }, "CA5-2026": { "title": "In re Naoise Connolly Ryan, et al., Nos. 25-11253 and 25-11254 (5th Cir.), revised opinion on petitions for rehearing, 22 May 2026", "type": "court", "url": "https://www.justice.gov/criminal/media/1454141/dl?inline", "via_press": false, "date": "2026-05-22", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-20" }, "EASA-RTS": { "title": "EASA declares Boeing 737 MAX safe to return to service in Europe", "type": "regulator", "url": "https://www.easa.europa.eu/en/newsroom-and-events/press-releases/easa-declares-boeing-737-max-safe-return-service-europe", "via_press": false, "date": "2021-01-27", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-20" }, "NTSB-ET302": { "title": "NTSB Publishes Additional Comments on Ethiopia's Final Report on 737 MAX 8 Accident", "type": "regulator", "url": "https://www.ntsb.gov/news/press-releases/Pages/NR20230124.aspx", "via_press": false, "date": "2023-01-24", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": "accredited representative of the state where the aircraft was designed and built", "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-20" }, "CVRA-2022": { "title": "Second Memorandum Opinion and Order (Crime Victims' Rights Act), United States v. The Boeing Company, No. 4:21-cr-5-O (N.D. Tex.), 21 October 2022, ECF No. 116", "type": "court", "url": "https://www.justice.gov/media/1329401/dl?inline", "date": "2022-10-21", "tier": "public_regulatory", "interest": null, "primary": true, "checked": "2026-10-21", "via_press": false } }, "derived_by": "backfill-curated", "reviewed_by": "Saurabh Bhatnagar (editor)" }