WASHINGTON/JAKARTA (Reuters) – Boeing Co plans to offer as standard a safety feature that might have warned earlier of problems that possibly played a role in the doomed Ethiopian and Indonesian plane crashes that killed almost 350 people, two officials briefed on the matter said Thursday.

Boeing will mandate a previously optional cockpit warning light as part of the forthcoming software update to the 737 MAX fleet that was grounded in the wake of the fatal crashes, said the officials, who asked not to be identified.

The March 10 Ethiopian Airlines crash that killed all 157 on board has set off one of the widest inquiries in aviation history and cast a shadow over the Boeing MAX model intended to be a standard for decades.

Reuters

Photo Rob Vogelaar