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Automation in planes — taking control of flight systems from pilots and putting it in the hands of machines — has steadily increased in recent decades. Two crashes involving Boeing's 737 Max that killed 346 people were both attributed largely to MCAS, the plane's automated system designed to keep it level in the sky. Business Insider spoke with aviation experts and former plane-safety officials...

Boeing has announced that it will temporarily halt production of the 737 Max plane. The plane has been grounded by the FAA for almost a year following two major crashes. Boeing announced that it would not be making any layoffs as a result of this decision and that employees would instead be redirected to other tasks. However, there is now an increasing backlog of...

Boeing's chief engineer overseeing commercial airplanes including the 737 Max is retiring, according to the Seattle Times. John Hamilton has been heading up Boeing's response to the two fatal 737 Max crashes. Boeing said that he initially planned to retire last year. Hamilton testified alongside CEO Dennis Muilenburg in front of two Congressional panels last month. Sign up for Business Insider's transportation newsletter, Shifting Gears,...

A near-crash during a flight-simulator session in June led to a complete redesign of the Boeing 737 Max's flight computer architecture, according to a new Bloomberg report. That redesign is in addition to the software fix to an automated system that caused two fatal crashes. It has led to extensive delays getting the plane back into commercial service. The flight computer in the 737...

Australian airline Qantas found cracks in a 737 Next Generation plane, adding to Boeing's woes. The cracking problem had already been discovered by Boeing, prompting the US aviation regulator to order airlines to inspect planes that had made more than 30,000 flights. But this Quantas plane had made fewer than 27,000 flights. More than 50 737NG planes have now been grounded around the world,...