Indonesian carrier cancels order for 49 Boeing 737 MAX 8 liners



03/22/2019 11:28 AM


Indonesia's national carrier Garuda Indonesia canceled an order to acquire 49 Boeing 737 MAX 8 airliners, the Financial Times reported on Friday.



Bathara Sakti
“We sent a letter to Boeing asking to cancel the order. Garuda passengers lost their confidence and do not want to fly the Boeing 737 MAX,” the newspaper quoted a representative of the Indonesian air carrier.

It is noted that the airline has already received one aircraft of this model and paid $ 26 million. In total, the airline planned to acquire 50 aircraft with a total value of 4.9 billion dollars.

The carrier, according to the representative, does not plan to abandon other models of the manufacturer.

“In principle, it’s not that we want to completely abandon Boeing, perhaps we’ll just take another model,” he said.

The Financial Times emphasizes that Garuda was the first airline to terminate a contract with Boeing after a plane crash in Ethiopia.

Safety of the Boeing-737 Max was questioned after aircraft of this type suffered two crashes in less than five months.

At the end of October 2018, Boeing-737 Max 8 of the Indonesian company Lion Air fell into the Java Sea shortly after departure from Jakarta airport. All 189 people on board perished.

Ethiopian Airlines' Boeing-737 Max 8, flying from Addis Ababa to Nairobi, crashed on March 10 of this year, the crash killed 157 people.

source: ft.com


More