Category Archives for Aircraft.
Pilot unions will fight against continued loss in jobs, and very few would push the button today to go from two to one human in the cockpit. But the technology will arrive that will make travel much safer replacing a human at least as co-pilot. And at that point pilot unions will be clearly lobbying against safety.
The Alaska Airlines incident occurred after market close on Friday. By the time markets opened on Monday, the value of Boeing stock had fallen by $12 billion. As Matt Levine observes, the cost to shareholders was far greater than to passengers on the Alaska flight.
Kirby is apparently seeking management changes at Boeing after losing confidence in the planemaker. Whether Boeing’s CEO stays or goes may rest with the federal government.
A reader at respected airline industry site Leeham News offered a comment that suggests they have access to Boeing’s internal quality control systems, and shares details of what they saw regarding the Boeing 737 MAX 9 flown by Alaska Airlines that had a door plug detach inflight, causing rapid decompression of the aircraft.
The takeaway appears to be that outsourced plane components have so many problems when they show up at the production line that Boeing’s quality control staff can’t keep up with them all.
Numerous 737 MAX 9s have been inspected, and some others have had loose door plugs. There are four bolts that are supposed to hold in onto the frame. But we don’t know whether these were installed incorrectly or whether they actually were installed correctly and loosen over time as the plane flies. And the answer to this question matters a lot.
Boeing has major problems. So does Spirit Aerosystems, which produces many of the components of their planes, it seems. But that, too, is a Boeing problem. It’s no longer possible to paper over those. And airlines that buy and operate Boeing aircraft are going to have to take on greater responsibility for safety assurance. The Boeing brand has been damaged.
A kid had their shirt pulled out the missing piece of fuselage, while his mother held onto him. And two cell phones flew out of the plane.
One made worldwide news when it was recovered intact after dropping more than 16,000 feet out of the sky. It was found on the side of a road, in airplane mode, with details of the owner’s checked baggage up on the screen. It had been plugged in to charge, and was yanked off of the charger and out the side of the plane. There were “no scratches on it.”
Captain Chesley ‘Sully’ Sullenberger was captain pilot of US Airways flight 1549 which went down in a ditching in the Hudson River after a double bird strike. He was played by Tom Hanks in the eponymous film – the movie as a whole wasn’t very good but the entire thing was worth it for the flight sequence.
Now for the 15th anniversary of the flight, Sullenberger has narrated a “minute by minute replay” of what happened January 15, 2009.
A Lufthansa Airbus A340 widebody had its tow bar separate from the aircraft while pushing back from the gate in Munich, Germany. The tug loses control of the plane, and the pilots are rolling backward – unable to see behind them.
According to CEO Kirby, passengers bring small wheeled bags on board that are called “roller boards.” What on earth are those?
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
