Events

An American aviation safety expert says that flaws in the design of a Boeing plane that crashed near Amsterdam 11 years ago 'should have woken everyone up' to issues that would later affect its Max designs.

Boeing and the United States government pressured Dutch investigators to focus blame on the pilots for a 2009 Turkish Airlines crash instead of design flaws in the airplane and safety lapses by the company, The New York Times is reporting.

The crash which killed nine people when it plummeted into a field near Amsterdam in February 2009 involved a Boeing 737-800, an aircraft that was considered the precursor to the 737-Max.

The 737-Max has been grounded since March after two fatal crashes within a six-month period - one in Indonesia and the other in Ethiopia - killed 346 people.