(Bloomberg) -- The chairman of the House committee overseeing aviation on Tuesday invited Boeing Co. Chairman Dennis Muilenburg and the company's chief engineer of commercial aircraft to testify before a hearing in Washington.
The Transportation and Infrastructure Committee will be holding the hearing on Oct. 30 on the 737 Max, the company's best-selling model that's been grounded worldwide since March 13 following its second fatal crash. The hearing is one day after the one-year anniversary of the first 737 Max crash, off the coast of Indonesia.
Committee Chairman Peter DeFazio, an Oregon Democrat, invited Muilenburg and John Hamilton, the chief engineer, to appear at the hearing, the committee said in a press release.
“Boeing has received the committee's invitation and is reviewing it now,” the company said in an email. “We will continue to cooperate with Congress and regulatory authorities as we focus on safely returning the Max to service.”
The committee's request may ratchet up tension between it and Boeing. Last Thursday, the committee sent a press release announcing it had asked the company to make several employees available for interviews.
Earlier: House Investigators Want to Talk to Boeing Workers About 737 Max
Boeing then responded that it was “deeply disappointed” that the committee had issued a release on what it called “private correspondence.”
The two crashes, in Indonesia and Ethiopia, killed a total of 346 people. In both cases, a malfunction prompted an automated flight-control system to command the plane to dive. Boeing had anticipated that pilots could respond to the emergency, but crews in both cases lost control.
To contact the reporter on this story: Alan Levin in Washington at alevin24@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jon Morgan at jmorgan97@bloomberg.net, John Harney, Laurie Asséo
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