A Norwegian Air Boeing 737 Max
By Irish Echo Staff
The Irish Aviation Authority has placed a temporary suspension order on all flights into and out of Irish air space by Boeing 737 Max passenger planes – this following the crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 Max 8 that led to the deaths of 157 people, including Irish aid worker Michael Ryan, citizens of 35 nations and eight Americans.
The suspension, which covers all variants of the Max, resulted in a Norwegian Air flight from Dublin to Stewart Airport in New York being cancelled earlier today. That means that the return flight to Dublin from Stewart this evening is also cancelled.
Norwegian said it was grounding its Boeing 737 Max fleet, the Journal.ie reported.
The grounding has also resulted in a cancellation of a flight from Dublin to Providence, Rhode Island.
On Wednesday, Norwegian announced that it will temporarily deploy a Boeing 787 Dreamliner to operate U.S. flights from Dublin Airport.
In a statement, the IAA said it suspended the flights in the light of the two fatal accidents involving the aircraft in recent months, which it described as “unprecedented.”
The Ethiopian Airlines crash on Sunday followed the crash of an Indonesian Lion Air jet of the several months ago in which all 189 people on board were killed.
“This decision has been taken based on ensuring the continued safety of passengers and flight crew, which is the IAA’s number one priority,” the IAA said.
The Irish move followed a decision by the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority to ban the Boeing’s from British airspace. The European Union has also imposed a suspension as have a number of countries around the world including China and Australia.
The IAA said it had been closely monitoring the situation but lacking sufficient information from the (Ethiopian Airlines) flight data recorder “we have, as a precautionary measure, issued instructions to stop any commercial passenger flights on Boeing 737 MAX from any operator arriving, departing or overflying Irish airspace.”
The IAA said it would continue to work closely with the European Aviation Safety Agency, the U.S. Federal Aviation Authority and Boeing.
At presstime, the FAA had not ordered any suspension within U.S. airspace.
