The families of the 346 victims of the crashes involving Boeing 737 MAX model in Indonesia and Ethiopia would be compensated, as the aeroplane maker, Boeing has announced the launching of a compensation fund for relatives of the victims.
In a statement made available to the public, Boeing said that the 346 victims would receive a compensation fee of $144,500 (N52,164,500) each. The fund, according to the statement, is being managed by a prominent U.S attorney, Ken Feinberg.
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It is, however, of general knowledge that Feinberg worked on similar compensation projects in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks and the BP Deepwater Horizon oil disaster. He has assured claimants that they would not be required to waive the right to litigate in order to receive compensation.
Prior to this development, United States Lawmakers had set up a committee to examine what led to the crashing of Boeing’s aircraft. The committee was set up to investigate the matter and question the employees of the company in their drive to ascertain the exact cause of the plane crash which was blamed on a faulty Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS).
The Backstory: In March 2019, a Boeing 737-800 Max, Ethiopia Airline ET302 scheduled to fly from Addis Ababa Bole International Airport in Ethiopia to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi, Kenya crashed after six minutes of taking off, killing all 157 passengers on board.
This was the second crash involving Boeing after Lion Air 610, another Boeing aircraft crashed five months earlier. The Boeing 737-800 Max, Ethiopia Airline ET302 killed 35 different nationals on board including Nigerian Professor, Pius Adesanmi. After the crash, aeveral Airlines, including Cayman Airlines, reviewed their business agreements with the Boeing 737-8 aircraft.
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The Boeing 737 MAX 8 model first flew on 29 January 2016 and entered service in 2017, making it one of the newest aircraft in Boeing’s commercial airliner offerings, and the newest generation of Boeing 737 planes.