Component came loose in flight
Screws loose: Alaska and United Airlines find defects in other Boeing aircraft
A Boeing 737 Max approaching to land at Seattle Airport
© Elaine Thompson / AP / DPA
Passengers were shocked when the outer wall of their Boeing plane suddenly came apart. Now it turned out that the parts were not permanently installed – and must also be screwed into other machines.
After a fuselage part of a Boeing 737 Max 9 broke out in flight, two US airlines discovered problems with other aircraft of this type. Alaska Airlines and United Airlines reported loose screws and parts on Monday (local time) after initial inspections. It was not initially announced how many machines have been affected so far. The manufacturer Boeing is threatened with new trouble with the 737 Max if there are indications that this is not an isolated case.
During inspections, suspected defects were discovered in connection with the installation of cover panels that close an unnecessary emergency exit, the airline said on Monday. There were screws that had to be tightened. Installing the cover plate is a configuration that Boeing offers if the number of existing emergency exits is already sufficient in relation to the number of seats in the aircraft.
The emergency exit of the Boeing 737 comes off – the plane has to make an emergency landing
On Friday, an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 MAX 9 took off from Portland in the northwest of the USA and was on its way to Ontario in California when, according to passengers, part of the cabin wall flew out shortly after takeoff.
The plane then turned around and made an emergency landing in Portland around 20 minutes later. According to the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), the cover plate of an unused emergency exit opened and came loose during the flight. The 171 passengers on Friday’s Alaska flight largely escaped shock. According to experts, this is also thanks to fortunate circumstances: no one was sitting directly next to the part that broke out and all passengers were still wearing their seatbelts during the climb.
Screws loose in several machines
The US aviation authority FAA ordered aircraft of this type to be grounded and inspected at the weekend. United has the largest fleet of affected aircraft, with 79 MAX-9s. According to media reports, Alaska has 65 machines – and there are a good 170 machines worldwide. According to the local authority EASA, no aircraft in the European Union are affected by decommissioning or inspections.
United has now discovered loose screws on ten aircraft, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters on Monday. The number of affected machines could still increase.
Boeing criticized for fatal plane crashes
The incident raises new doubts among industry experts about the production of the 737 Max. “It was really important to find out whether just this one aircraft was affected on Friday evening,” said Anthony Brickhouse, an aviation safety expert at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. “The fact that United has now found several aircraft with loose screws means the investigation is expanding.”
Boeing’s share price fell eight percent on Monday. The 737 Max is a Boeing bestseller, but it has already plunged the company into a deep crisis. After two fatal crashes, aircraft of this type had to remain on the ground for more than a year and a half from March 2019 until improvements to a flight assistance system were made.
It is unclear when the fleet will be put back into service.