The United States government has ordered inspections of Boeing 737s flying worldwide, to see if any have potentially defective flight control modules that could make the planes hard to control.

The emergency order by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) gives airlines 10 days to complete the review.

Each plane has two modules regulating hydraulic fluid to the flight control system. A failure of both could make the jetliners difficult to operate, FAA spokesman Paul Takemoto told the Associated Press news agency.

The FAA says it is looking for a recent batch of modules that has a high rate of failure.

Fifteen modules were found to be defective during recent inspections, Mr Takemoto said. None caused an accident.

There are a total of 93 aircraft worldwide with the modules from the bad batch, he added.

Last month, the FAA warned airlines around the world about a potentially dangerous fault in a batch of fuel pumps for Boeing aircraft.

Mandatory checks on about 1,400 planes, including many 737s, were carried out by US airlines.