U.S. Senate panel delays consideration of FAA reform bill

The U.S. Senate Commerce Committee has postponed consideration of a bill to overhaul how the Federal Aviation Administration certifies new airplanes in the wake of two fatal Boeing 737 MAX crashes, a spokesman for Democrats on the panel confirmed.

The committee had been scheduled to consider the 70-page revised bill jointly endorsed by Senate Commerce Committee chairman Roger Wicker, a Republican, and the committee’s top Democrat Maria Cantwell. The measure would marks the most significant effort toward adopting reforms since the 2018 and 2019 Boeing 737 MAX crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia that killed 346 people.