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To Babbitt, the lack of a specific safety flaw leading to the grounding is one of the most confounding aspects of the global response. China, one of the first nation’s to act, said it was acting specifically because no cause for the latest accident has been identified.

It sets a very bad precedent. It's premature to just ground the airplane based on speculation Randy Babbitt, former head of the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration

“We are in touch with Boeing and the FAA and sent people to investigate and follow up with the progress of the probe,” Li Jian, deputy director of Civil Aviation Administration of China told reporters on Monday.

“The Max plane has changes in design from that of previous generation and looks like it has brought uncertainties in risks,” Li said. “Through our analysis of the two accidents we believe there are some commonality in the two and cause of the incidents might be due to design defaults.”

The FAA certified the Max in 2017. As a result of the Lion Air crash on Oct. 29, the FAA said Monday it will order Boeing to redesign safety software on the plane that repeatedly pushed down the nose as a result of a malfunction to make it less likely to lead to an accident in the future.

Boeing on Tuesday reiterated that it has “full confidence” in the safety of the 737 Max. Since the FAA isn’t mandating any new action, “based on the information currently available, we do not have any basis to issue new guidance to operators.”

“We understand that regulatory agencies and customers have made decisions that they believe are most appropriate for their home markets,” Boeing said in a statement. “We’ll continue to engage with all of them to ensure they have all the information they need to have the confidence they need safely continue to operate their fleets or return them to service.”