* Shareholders accused Boeing ( BA ) of concealing safety

warnings

* Judge finds common means to measure damages

* Boeing ( BA ) paid $2.5 billion to settle with US government

* Boeing ( BA ) not available for comment

By Jonathan Stempel

March 17 (Reuters) - A federal judge certified a

shareholder class action accusing Boeing ( BA ) of concealing

safety deficiencies in its 737 MAX planes before two crashes

that killed 346 people in 2018 and 2019.

In a decision on Monday, U.S. District Judge Franklin

Valderrama in Chicago said shareholders who owned Boeing ( BA ) stock

between November 7, 2018 and October 18, 2019 may sue as a group

because they demonstrated a common means to measure damages. The

class period ended two months earlier than shareholders wanted.

Class actions can allow greater recoveries at lower cost

than individual lawsuits. The shareholders are led by a group of

pension funds and private investors.

Boeing ( BA ) faces a separate class action in the Alexandria, Virginia

federal court, claiming it overstated its commitment to safe

aircraft prior to the January 2024 mid-air cabin panel

blowout on an Alaska Airlines 737 MAX 9.

Neither Boeing ( BA ) nor its lawyers immediately responded to

requests for comment on Tuesday. Salvatore Graziano, a lawyer

for the shareholders, declined to comment.

Shareholders accused Boeing ( BA ) of rushing development of the

737 MAX, ignoring safety warnings from employees, and misleading

the Federal Aviation Administration about the plane's safety

because it feared losing market share to Airbus, whose

A320 series is the 737's main competitor.

They sued the Arlington, Virginia-based company following

the deaths of 189 people in a Lion Air crash in October 2018,

and 157 people in an Ethiopian Airlines crash in March 2019.

Shareholders wanted the class period to end on December 16,

2019, saying Boeing's ( BA ) temporary suspension of MAX production

that day exposed the company's "unrealistic" timeline to resume

flights. Boeing ( BA ) objected, saying it was already known the plane

would be out of service until 2020.

The class period ends on a day the market learned that the

MAX's chief technical pilot Mark Forkner expressed concern in

2016 that an automated system on the plane was "running

rampant."

In January 2021, Boeing ( BA ) agreed to pay more than $2.5 billion to

resolve a U.S. Department of Justice criminal charge it

conspired to defraud the FAA about the MAX's safety.