Kelly Njuguna, Paul Njuguna, Ryan Njuguna, and Carolyne Karanja are seen in this undated photograph.Paul Njoroge says he believes Boeing should scrap the 737 Max, and he wants the company's top executives to resign and face criminal charges for not grounding the plane after a deadly accident last October.
On Wednesday, Njoroge is due to be the first relative of any of the 346 passengers who died in those crashes to testify before Congress. He will be accompanied by Michael Stumo, whose daughter, Samya, also died in the March 10 crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 Max. Because the size and placement of the plane's engines raised the risk of an aerodynamic stall, Boeing devised flight-control software called MCAS. Preliminary reports indicate that the software pushed the nose of the plane down in both crashes, and Boeing is working on changes to make MCAS more reliable and easier to control.
"I'd like to see Dennis Muilenburg and the executives resign, because they caused the deaths of 346 people," Njoroge said. "They should be held liable criminally for the deaths of my wife and my children and my mom-in-law and 152 others in the crash of Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 because that was preventable."
Njoroge was born in Kenya and now lives in Toronto, where he works as an investment professional. A Chicago aviation lawyer, Robert Clifford, sued Boeing on his behalf over the deaths of his wife, Carol, his son and daughters, 6-year-old Ryan, 4-year-old Kelli and 9-month-old Rubi, and his wife's mother.
After the Oct. 29 crash involving Indonesia's Lion Air, Boeing issued a bulletin to pilots reminding them about Boeing instructions for handling a nose-down pitch of the plane. After the Ethiopian crash, Muilenburg said the pilots did not completely follow the procedures. The preliminary report indicated the Ethiopian pilots tried the procedures nearly until the end but could not save the plane, and they were flying extremely fast.