The FAA is investigating a software glitch in some Boeing 737 Max jets that could prompt an automated flight guidance system to disengage during an aborted landing.
Page A4From§Eachthe late evening edition — 29 September 2026
FAA opens new probe into 737 Max flight-control software blamed for 189 deaths in 2019
As it ran on the front
I have in front of me a single sentence from the Federal Aviation Administration, filed this week, and I would like to read it with you. All together now — the FAA is investigating a software glitch in some Boeing 737 Max jets that could cause an automated flight guidance system to disengage during an aborted landing. That is the whole of what the wire carries. I have no more pages than that.
The phrase worth sitting with is "automated flight guidance system." This aircraft has a file on that system already, and the file is thick.…
…(cont) On October 25, 2019, Indonesian investigators closed their probe of the Lion Air crash with a 353-page final report. It named three causes together: flawed software design by Boeing, a failure by Lion Air to ground the jet over problems it had already flown through, and the pilots' response to the emergency the software created. The crash killed 189 people.
Before that report ever printed, the airplane already had a plaintiff. Fifty-nine days earlier, on August 27, 2019, a Russian leasing firm, Avia Capital Services, holding orders for 35 of the jets, sued Boeing in an Illinois court — the first legal action taken by a Max customer since the worldwide grounding that spring. Avia sought damages and cancellation of its order, alleging Boeing had negligently introduced design flaws into the aircraft and made negligent representations to the FAA to get it certified in the first place. Lawyers for Avia said at the time they were discussing joining the case with other lessors. Nearly 400 of the jets were grounded worldwide when the suit was filed.
All together now, once more — read this week's sentence again. An automated system, on this jet, that can disengage on its own during an aborted landing. The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating. I do not have the page that tells you what happens to the jets already carrying passengers while it does. The wire does not carry that page. I have only the sentence, and the sentence is the same one this airplane has generated before.
“Same plane, same system, same word "disengage," and the only thing new is the date stamp. Boeing got sued over this software in 2019, before the crash report even printed, and here we are seven years later reading the identical sentence off a new form. Nobody in that filing tells you whether the plane you're boarding tonight has the fix or just the paperwork.”
“Look, an investigation opening is the system working — that's oversight, that's the FAA doing its job, full stop. Sure, it's the same flight-control system as before, but finding a glitch before it becomes a headline is a victory for — wait, did I just call the seventh year of this a victory? That's not what I meant to say.”
The receipts
· Indonesian investigators conclude their probe of the disaster with the release of a 353-page final report. The report states the crash was caused by a combination of flawed software design by Boeing, from the morgue, 25 Oct 2019
· Russian aircraft leasing firm Avia Capital Services, which has ordered 35 Boeing 737 MAX aircraft, sues Boeing in an Illinois court in the first legal action taken by a 737 MAX customer in the wake of from the morgue, 27 Aug 2019
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.