jimjim1 & linked article from fierceelectronics
The litigation referenced in that article is the FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) lawsuit which has cropped up here in a number of previous posts....the Nov. 18 court filing by FAA seeks to gain court approval for its withholding of Boeing documents that the FlyersRights group has been trying to wrestle out of FAA's confidentiality clutches.
FOIA litigation is notoriously slow-moving. Nevertheless, among the best arguments FlyersRights presented was that the public interest demanded that the FAA disclose all the relevant documents to the panel of experts FR had assembled BEFORE making a decision on ungrounding the aircraft. How this weighs into an evidently pending decision about further litigation challenges, we'll have to wait and see. (As just SLF, I only recognize that the most insistent and most strident critics of the 737 MAX, and perhaps also critics of less intensity, may be convinced the airframe has longitudinal stability problems without MCAS, despite assurances to the contrary by Boeing and others.....how can the public figure out who is correct?)
Will be worth watching to see if either the House or Senate bills which revisit FAA processes for certification (and would implement a range of other steps) will try (by amendment) to tackle exceptions for maintaining confidentiality of information submitted to FAA. There unquestionably are strong arguments against doing that but at some point, is the privilege of confidentiality being maintained lost by sufficiently egregious conduct?