Vietnam
Vietnam allows Boeing 737 Max to enter its airspace after two years. Credit: Jeff Hitchcock via Wikipedia.

The Vietnamese Ministry of Transport has reportedly announced its decision to partially lift the existing flight ban on Boeing 737 Max aircraft.

The approval to allow the aircraft to travel through Vietnamese airspace follows a proposal made by the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV) last month, reported Reuters citing the country’s state media.

The CAAV made its proposal after closely monitoring Boeing’s efforts to improve the aircraft and evaluation by major aviation authorities, including the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the European Union Aviation Safety Agency.

The ban on Boeing 737 Max flight operations in the country’s airspace was imposed two years ago.

The authority suspended the issuance of new licences for the aircraft and invalidated the existing ones in March 2019, following two fatal crashes that killed 346 people in Ethiopia and Indonesia.

CAAV has been advised to continue monitoring the situation and update itself.

Meanwhile, China, Australia, Russia and other Southeast Asian countries are yet to open up their airspace for this aircraft model.

The ministry will fully lift the ban on the aircraft only after the above countries withdraw their suspension orders and satisfy Vietnamese regulations.

Last December, the FAA already allowed the Boeing 737 Max to resume operations and Europe to follow suit in January.

Other regulators from Japan, Europe, the UK, Canada, Brazil, the UAE and Australia allowed for the operation of the aircraft’s following technical modifications and additional pilot training.

Late last month, US carrier Southwest Airlines placed an order for 100 Boeing 737 MAX jets following a multi-year evaluation to modernise its fleet.