Boeing awards $ 500 million to Ethiopia plane crash victims in first settlement
NAIROBI, Kenya – Boeing has disbursed $ 500 million for the families of the victims of the plane crash in Ethiopia that took place in 2019 as well as for those who perished in 2018 in Indonesia, as part of the agreement reached in the case against the company.
According to Ribbeck Law Chartered, who represents more than 90 clients, made the announcement after at least three years of litigation, having paid $ 500 million in the first settlement.
“For most of our customers, this ends the civil and criminal proceedings against Boeing following the tragic crashes of Lion Air JT610 on October 29, 2018 and Ethiopian Airlines ET302 on March 10, 2019,” said Manuel von Ribbeck of Ribbeck . Law Chartered said in a statement.
The Ethiopian Airlines plane to Nairobi crashed minutes after taking off from Bole International Airport in Addis Ababa, killing at least 149 people. At least 32 Kenyans were on board, including people of 30 different nationalities.
Last week, Washington opened a $ 500 million victim assistance fund as part of the settlement to help the families of those who died. As of Friday, those in Kenya had received nearly $ 1.56 million in compensation.
The payment comes just months after a Kenyan family of a victim of the Ethiopian Airline crash in 2019 agreed to a $ 3.27 million settlement to drop a lawsuit against U.S. aircraft maker Boeing.
Another plane of the same model had been involved in a crash less than five months earlier when a Lion Air flight crashed at sea near Indonesia with nearly 190 people on board.
Boeing agreed in January to pay the settlement after the US Department of Justice discovered the airline had design flaws it hid from regulators and pilots.
The Boeing 737 MAX final report, released in September 2020 by a legislative committee in the United States, found Boeing’s “repeated and serious failures” and identified key factors that contributed to the Boeing 737 MAX crash, including design flaws, profits and production priorities at the expense of safety.
It is alleged the company escaped FAA scrutiny, withheld critical information from pilots, and ultimately commissioned planes that killed 346 innocent people in the two crashes.
“The families we have represented since the start of this tragedy involving the 737 MAX 8 crashes have started receiving settlement funds,” said Ribbeck.
He added that the criminal case which revealed serious and fatal mistakes had been made by the Boeing company had been closed. “
“The misleading statements, half-truths and omissions communicated by Boeing employees to the FAA have hampered the government’s ability to ensure the safety of the flying public,” the US Department of Justice concluded.
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