Carlos A. Velasquez of Velasquez Dolan Arias in Plantation. Courtesy photo.

Plantation attorney Carlos A. Velasquez, partner at Velasquez Dolan Arias, has launched the first in a string of litigation that could spell turbulence for Chicago aircraft maker Boeing Corp. and plane sensor manufacturer Rosemount Aerospace Inc. over an Ethiopian Airlines crash in March.

Flight ET 302 crashed minutes after it left Ethiopian soil March 10, killing everyone on board. Questions have since swirled about whether the tragedy was preventable as it bore eerie similarities to a Lion Air crash in 2018. Both involved the same Boeing 737 Max 8 model, equipped with a new safety feature that allegedly wasn't in the instruction manual or mentioned to pilots.

Velasquez's client represents the estate of Helen Waithira Karanja, who died in the crash on her way to collect her daughter from boarding school in Nairobi, Kenya, and bring her home for good. Karanja was a Kenyan citizen but lived and worked in Vienna, Austria.

“As you can imagine, her daughter Charlotte, who is now 13 years old, is just devastated about the loss of her mom,” said Velasquez, who's in Kenya meeting with new and prospective clients who lost family to the disaster.

The plane was equipped with a heavier, more powerful engine, according to the wrongful death lawsuit in the Northern District of Illinois. That changed its aerodynamic balance, causing the aircraft to raise its nose upwards — or pitch-up, in pilot speak — which can stall the plane, according to the filing. The suit alleges Boeing came up with a fix, installing technology that could read data from the plane's nose and automatically push it back down again, stabilizing the plane.

Velasquez's client alleges that sensor was defective and that it incorrectly concluded the nose was too high, pushing the plane into a nose dive. The suit claims pilots didn't know about that safety feature and therefore weren't able to properly combat its effects.

The flight took off from Addis Ababa Bole International Airport at 8:38 a.m. and went dark  about six minutes later.

Boeing declined to comment on the case but has temporarily grounded its 737 Max 8 fleet in response to public concern.

Karanja's family accuse Boeing of negligence, product liability, failure to warn and civil conspiracy, claiming the company rushed the approval process for its new model, downplaying hazards and safety concerns to get a competitive edge. The plaintiff accuses co-defendant Rosemount Aerospace of negligence and strict liability for its role in designing the “Angle of Attack” sensor. Rosemount's parent company, United Technologies, declined comment.

Meanwhile, Velasquez appears to be gearing to represent more plaintiffs. The Broward litigator specializes in aviation, personal injury and wrongful death litigation, and has won million-dollar verdicts for plane and helicopter crash victims.

“When somebody has wronged somebody else, be it an individual, a corporation or a government agency, I think it's important that it be shown that they're responsible for the action and that the families that have been wronged be adequately compensated under the law,” he said.

The Ethiopian Aviation Administration has gathered a committee and enlisted help from other countries including the U.S. and France, according to Velasquez, who expects to file more lawsuits in the coming weeks.

Read the full complaint:

Related stories:

Miami, Chicago Attorneys Suing Boeing in Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 Crash

Iberia Airlines Jets Past $1.2 Million in Damages