FAA Restores Partial Safety Certification Powers to Boeing for 737 Max and 787 Dreamliner

After 18 months of heightened scrutiny by U.S. regulators, the FAA restores partial authority to Boeing to certify the safety of individual aircraft, including the 737 Max and 787 Dreamliner models the company builds.

Previously Boeing lost these delegated authorities: airworthiness certification for the 737 in 2019 following the Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines crashes, and the 787 production attestations in 2022 due to quality issues. The 2024 plug-door incident involving the 737 Max prompted a government investigation and demanded substantial reforms in the quality-control system.

Consequences and New FAA Approaches

However, the FAA will not hand over full keys outright: it was announced that Boeing would be able to issue airworthiness certificates in the coming weeks, while the agency would perform them in the interim weeks.

Safety guides everything we do, and the FAA will allow this step forward only when we are confident that it can be carried out safely.

The agency also emphasizes that oversight of Boeing’s manufacturing processes will remain direct and stringent, regardless of changes in the distribution of authority.

Over the past 12–18 months, testimony from witnesses and anonymous sources has emerged about concerns over safety and quality, particularly in the context of the production of the 737 Max and the 787.

After the U.S. Department of Justice under the Biden administration determined that Boeing’s recent safety issues violated the previous agreement, Boeing agreed last year to acknowledge its involvement in two fatal 737 Max crashes. However, under the Trump administration, the criminal case was dropped, which became an example of a softer approach to alleged corporate malfeasance.

Such changes are shaping a new balance between speed to market and strict quality control, with significant implications for flight safety and passengers’ trust in air travel in the future.