FAA has posted the draft of revised Boeing 737 minimum training standards that incorporate the MAX’s maneuvering characteristics augmentation system (MCAS) for a third public comment period. The new comment deadline is May 15. The draft Flight Standardization Board (FSB) report does not recommend simulator training for the MCAS or its failure modes, sticking to recommendations made by a board that reviewed Boeing’s proposed updates to the system in March. MAX training “must include” the MCAS in a list of “special emphasis areas” covered in ground training, the report stated. “MCAS ground training must address system description, functionality, associated failure conditions and flight crew alerting. These items must be included in initial, upgrade, transition, differences and recurrent training,” it added. It would be Level B, or computer-based, training. The FSB report, which covers all versions of the 737 since the family is on a single type certificate, is in its 17th revision. Finalizing the standards is one of the final key steps to getting the 737’s operations bans removed by regulators.<br/>
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Airlines across Europe are bracing for another summer of flight disruption, as French air traffic controllers prepare to strike for the first time this summer later today and operators face restrictions related to ATC capacity issues. The 35h walkout in France, part of widespread strike action across the country, is set to start at 19:00 local time today and end at 05:00 on 10 May. Network manager Eurocontrol says it is hard to predict disruptions, but has asked operators to reduce flight programmes by 30% at Paris Orly, Lyon, Marseille and Toulouse airports. Among those to be hit is UK low-cost carrier EasyJet, which says around 65% of its flights pass through French airspace. Airlines have warned repeatedly that passengers should expect disruption this summer as a result of expected strikes, staff shortages and congestion as Europe's skies struggle to keep up with growing travel demand. Eurocontrol says that ATC staffing issues, weather, an increase in traffic and a lack of capacity had resulted in 25.6m minutes of air traffic flow management (ATFM) delay in 2018. With each minute costing users around E70, that resulted in an additional cost of E1.7b for airspace users. This year, Eurocontrol warns, "could be just as bad, as the overall network capacity is less than it was in 2018".<br/>
Saudi Arabia replaced the head of its civil aviation authority on Wednesday, after lengthy flight delays at domestic airports disrupted journeys at the start of a busy annual travel season. A royal decree appointed Abdelhadi al-Mansouri president of the General Authority for Civil Aviation (GACA), which oversees airport operations across the country. His predecessor was sacked in January. Local media reported cancellations and delays of up to 11 hours over the past five days as the Muslim holy month of Ramadan began, with many people making pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina or visiting family in other cities. Disgruntled travelers took to social media to complain. A photo of an information board at Riyadh airport showed delays on almost every domestic route, and a video showed scores of people crowded outside a state-owned Saudi Arabian Airlines (Saudia) ticket office. One passenger said that delays on Saudia had forced him to re-book on a different airline two days later. Another traveller said she saw no delays or crowding by Wednesday morning when she flew out of Riyadh with another carrier. Saudia, which seemed to have most of the delays, called them "exceptional" and attributed them to "unusual operation conditions".<br/>