UK civil aviation regulators have announced that they will establish their own airline blacklist under contingency plans drawn up should the UK crash out of the EU without a withdrawal agreement.

This list would be set up on the date of the UK’s exit from the EU – currently set for 29 March – and will “mirror” the European Commission’s current blacklist.

Unlike the European Commission’s blacklist, the UK’s equivalent would not be contained in legislation because “it does not itself impose the bans but reflects bans that have been imposed by the exercise of statutory powers”.

Data retrieved from the recently crashed Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 Max 8 shows "clear similarities" with the October 2018 crash of a Lion Air aircraft, according to the Ethiopian transport minister The recorder is "in a good condition that enabled us to extract almost all the data inside", the ministry added.

The flight data recorders were shipped in recent days to France for review. Investigators have said the Lion Air jetliner crashed after the pilots were unable to arrest a descent initiated by software new to the 737 Max, known as the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS).

Boeing has halted deliveries of Boeing 737 Max in response to the global grounding of the aircraft, the company says.

"Boeing has paused delivery of 737 Max airplanes due to the temporary grounding," Boeing said in a statement. "We continue to build 737 Max airplanes, while assessing how the situation, including potential capacity constraints, will impact our production system."

"There has been no change in production rate at this time, but we continue to work through production decisions," Boeing adds.

The move comes in a year Boeing had hoped to boost 737 production from 52 to 57 aircraft monthly