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Sky news reporting that an Ethiopian Airlines 737 with 157 people on board, brand new to the fleet last November, has been lost. The Ethiopian government has already issued a message of condolence suggest there is little hope of survivors.

I'm sure it is only a few months since a previous 737 crash involving a nearly new aircraft. No doubt time will tell us whether it is a dreadful coincidence or if there is a concern with something on recent 737's. I would seem unthinkable.

Wasn’t the last one a trim runaway.

Having recently made two SLF flights with Mrs P on late model 737s (800? I wasn't really concentrating), I must confess this morning's news did run a shiver down my spine.

Rob P

Hope the 'rudder hard-over' gremlin isn't lurking Alien-style somewhere in the woodwork.

Peter

I'm a 737-800 regular. Trying not to think about it

This isn't the older 800 series though is it? Both crashes were of the new design Max series.

Aah misunderstood the model. Thanks @Paul_Sengupta

Kinda’ puts the majority of other issues in the shade when this sort of thing happens doesn’t it?

There will be some extremely worried people at Boeing right now, I imagine, especially after an apparently similar incident with a Lion Air 737 not so long ago.

Possible groundings in the offing?

KeithM wrote:There will be some extremely worried people at Boeing right now, I imagine, especially after an apparently similar incident with a Lion Air 737 not so long ago.

I missed that one -- what happened? (Vested interest as I fly Ryanair quite often…)

You have my sympathy

Rob P

I thought that the Lion Air 737 Max crash was related to a new AoA feature which supposedly improves stall resilience ?

As others have said, Boeing will be rather worried by this further accident. I would like to think though that if all automatics were disengaged, the aircraft would still be perfectly flyable.

A very low hours P2 according to the BBC report.

Iceman

Pictures posted on the dark side show the airline CEO walking at the crash site, possibly handling the debris. There are also reports of locals walking around in the rubble. Hopefully nobody steals the FDR/CVR before the authorities get to them.

A friend of mine was recently the PF on the first commercial flight of a MAX after delivery to Norwegian. He said it was very nice, but not really different to the "regular" 800. If there's an issue with the type, it's quite scary.

Sorry all, LION Air, not Ryan Air.

Was multi tasking earlier and misheard!

Ironically, it seems that the latter may be buying this version shortly.

You can go back and edit it so that it makes sense......

China has grounded its fleet of 737 Max jets, possibly a semi-political move, but seemingly quite sensible to me until Boeing / investigative agencies come up with a definitive answer to a possibly generic fault.

Iceman