Editorial: FAA, planemakers must restore confidence in regulation Pittsburgh Post-Gazette It was up and away for the Boeing 737 Max on Dec. 29 — the first commercial flight in the U.S. since the fleet was grounded in March 2019 following two fatal crashes. American Airlines flew the once ubiquitous plane, an industry staple, from Miami to New York and back again. The plane was allowed by the Federal Aviation Administration to take wing after Boeing made changes to an automated flight-control system that had been implicated in crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia that killed, collectively, 346 people. In both crashes, it was determined the system pushed down the nose of the plane repeatedly, based on faulty sensor readings, and the pilots couldn’t regain control.