Families of Boeing 737 MAX crash victims file suit against Boeing in Chicago

CHICAGO - Two families filed lawsuits against Boeing in Chicago on Monday over the 737 MAX crashes that killed 346 people, the same day when Boeing held its shareholders meeting at the James Simpson Theatre in the Field Museum of Natural History in downtown Chicago.

Manant Vaidya, the plaintiff, lost his father Pannagesh Bhaskar Vaidya, mother Hansini Pannagesh Vaidya, sister Kosha Pannagesh Vaidya, brother-in-law Preritkumar Dixit and two nieces, 14-year-old Ashka Dixit and and 13-year-old Anushka Dixit in the crash of the Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 in March 2019.

"I lost three generations of my family, my parents, my sister, my nieces. If a person lost just one life, their whole life is shattered. But right now with me, I'm more like, I don't know. I'm completely lost right now," said Vaidya at a news conference held at the Clifford Law Offices room in downtown Chicago on Monday.

Paul Njoroge, another plaintiff, lost his wife Carolyne Nduta Karanja, mother-in-law Ann Karanja, 6-year-old son Ryan Njoroge Njuguna, 4-year-old daughter Kellie W. Pauls and 9-month-old infant daughter Rubi W. Pauls.

"I stay up all night crying, thinking of the horror that they must have endured as pilots struggled to keep the plane flying for six minutes," he said. "The terror that my wife must have experienced with little Rubi on her lap ... Our two children beside her, crying for their daddy, my mom in law, feeling helplessness, those six minutes will forever be embedded in my mind. I was not there to help them. I couldn't save them."

Njoroge choked several times while reading his statement, Vaidya stood up and walked over to pat him on the back at one point.

Kevin Durkin, a partner at Clifford Law Offices, promised that if Boeing denies its negligence in the crash, his firm would "seek every single email, text message that was between them and the FAA".

Alleged problems with the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) have been widely reported to be a likely contributor to the crashes.

In a written statement published earlier, Boeing President and CEO Dennis Muilenburg said, "We at Boeing are sorry for the lives lost in the recent 737 MAX accidents ... All of us feel the immense gravity of these events across our company and recognize the devastation of the families and friends of the loved ones who perished."

"We've had teams of our top engineers and technical experts working tirelessly in collaboration with the Federal Aviation Administration and our customers to finalize and implement a software update that will ensure accidents like that of Lion Air Flight 610 and Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 never happen again," the statement read.