SerpApi.Org
Federal regulators are expected to certify Boeing’s second-to-last version of its 737 later this month, marking a significant—albeit belated—milestone for the plane maker.
The 737 MAX 7 is on track to gain approval in the latter weeks of July, assuming there are no late snags, people familiar with the matter said. Airlines need the jet model to be certified before it can carry passengers.
The jet is the smallest of the single-aisle MAX models. The 737, the first version of which made its debut in the 1960s, remains Boeing’s bestselling aircraft.
The Federal Aviation Administration’s approval would be a milestone for Boeing, which has spent years under close regulatory scrutiny after two fatal crashes of a larger version of the plane and a midair door-plug blowout.
The FAA is also expected to soon give Boeing back the authority to perform final safety signoffs of newly produced 737s, according to people familiar with the matter. The FAA revoked that privilege in 2019 after the crashes. Last year, the agency allowed Boeing to resume issuing some so-called airworthiness certificates for the jets.
An FAA spokeswoman said safety approvals would dictate the timing of the MAX 7 certification.
A Boeing spokesman referred to its chief executive’s recent comments about the jet maker’s progress with regulators.
Boeing has been working to ramp up production to meet brisk customer demand for new passenger jets. The company earlier this week opened a new 737 MAX production line in Everett, Wash., at a site that previously produced other jet models but had been idle.
CEO Kelly Ortberg said earlier this year that certification programs for both future MAX models were in their final stages and would be done by the end of 2026.
“There is clearly light at the end of the tunnel here,” Ortberg said at a May investor conference.
The MAX 7’s approval would be a long-awaited boost for one of Boeing’s biggest customers, Southwest Airlines.
The Dallas-based carrier only flies 737s. Delays with the MAX 7 have kept some of its older jets—the 737-700—in service longer than it planned. The 737-700s that Southwest flies are 20 years old on average.
Southwest has ordered 258 MAX 7 jets from Boeing, according to recent securities filings. The plane maker has already built about two dozen of the MAX 7 jets for Southwest, according to flight-data provider Cirium. They are currently parked at an airfield in Moses Lake, Wash.
Southwest said it doesn’t plan to start flying the MAX 7 until next year.
The certification of the MAX 7 has dragged on for years. In February 2018, Boeing said it expected the jet to enter service in 2019.
But in October 2018, a 737 MAX 8 took a fatal nosedive in Indonesia. A second fatal crash occurred in 2019, leading to a nearly two-year grounding of the plane. The crashes, which killed 346 people, resulted in years of scrutiny for Boeing and the FAA.
Boeing later agreed to work on a design change for a potential safety issue, at the request of Sen. Tammy Duckworth, an Illinois Democrat who at the time was chairwoman of the Senate’s aviation subcommittee. That further dragged out certification.
Boeing must still win certification of the longer MAX 10, its final version of the 737. Major customers include United Airlines and Delta Air Lines. Boeing is already building those jet models ahead of their expected certification later this year.
Write to Andrew Tangel at [email protected] and Drew FitzGerald at [email protected]