Trump: U.S. grounding Boeing 737 Max 8, 9 after Ethiopia crash

Associated Press
Wednesday, March 13, 2019 2:49 p.m. | Wednesday, March 13, 2019 2:49 p.m.

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Investigators from Israel examine wreckage at the scene where the Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 Max 8 crashed shortly after takeoff on Sunday killing all 157 on board, near Bishoftu, or Debre Zeit, south of Addis Ababa, in Ethiopia Tuesday, March 12, 2019. Ethiopian Airlines had issued no new updates on the crash as of late afternoon Tuesday as families around the world waited for answers, while a global team of investigators began picking through the rural crash site.

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In this file photo taken on March 11, 2019 A Boeing 737 flown by American Airlines passes by the Lockheed Martin building as it takes off from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in Arlington, Virginia. - President Donald Trump on March 13, 2019, announced a plan to ground all Boeing 737 MAX aircraft amid intense international and political pressure following the second deadly crash in less than five months. “We’re going to be issuing an emergency order of prohibition regarding all flights of the 737 MAX 8 and 737 MAX 9,” Trump told reporters the White House.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump says the U.S. is issuing an emergency order grounding all Boeing 737 Max 8 and Max 9 aircraft in the wake of a crash of an Ethiopian Airliner that killed 157 people.

Many nations in the world had already barred the Boeing 737 Max 8 from its airspace, but until now, the Federal Aviation Administration had been saying that it didn’t have any data to show the jets are unsafe.

Trump said Wednesday that the FAA would be making the announcement soon to ground the planes.

He says any plane currently in the air will go to its destination and then be grounded.

Trump says pilots and airlines have been notified.

He says the safety of the American people is of “paramount concern.”