The American airline Alaska Airlines has decided to immobilize its Boeing 737 MAX 9 planes after an aircraft with 177 people had to make an emergency landing in the United States shortly after takeoff due to a part of the plane falling off. “Following tonight's incident on Flight 1282, we have decided to temporarily ground our fleet of 65 Boeing 737-9 aircraft as a precautionary measure,” Alaska Airlines CEO Ben Minicucci announced. it's a statement.
The flight took off from Portland, in the northwest of the United States, on Friday at 5:00 p.m. local time, heading to Ontario, California, but had to return about 20 minutes later after “a pressurization problem” was reported, according to the company. US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on social network X. The images that have been published on the internet show oxygen masks hanging from the roof of the device and the rear left part of the fuselage with a hole that looks like the hole for an emergency door, apparently not enabled. Inside the plane, part of the cabin wall was also torn, exposing insulating material.
A passenger on the flight, Kyle Rinker, told CNN that the window had exploded just after takeoff. “Suddenly I heard a big bang,” said Elizabeth Le, another passenger, in an interview with local channel KCAL News. “Then I look to my left and I see a huge chunk, a part of the plane that was just missing and the wind was extremely strong. The wind was blowing everywhere, but everyone was in their seats,” she added.
According to witnesses cited by American media, no one occupied the seat closest to the gap. There were passengers in the middle and aisle seats, who were transferred to another part of the plane with the help of the flight attendants. The plane had been certified in October, according to FAA records available online collected by the AFP agency.
Flight attendants described the decompression as “explosive,” and one flight attendant suffered minor injuries, according to the Alaska Airlines Association of Flight Attendants. “The situation could have been catastrophic without the exceptional skill and professionalism of the flight attendants and pilots,” he points out in a statement. The flight was carrying 171 passengers and 6 crew members.
The incident threatens to once again put Boeing and its 737 MAX model in the eye of the hurricane after its flight permit was withdrawn in 2019 — the American manufacturer even suspended its manufacturing — following two fatal accidents that cost it its life. life to more than 300 people. In October 2018, the flight crashed in the Java Sea, Indonesia. 610 from the low-cost company Lion Air operated by a 737 MAX 8; A few months later, in March 2019, 157 people died on Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 in the largest air disaster of that year — the plane model was the same.
The investigation that was launched after the two accidents revealed flaws in the design of the model's stabilization system (MCAS) and that the company, despite having assured that the 737 MAX were as safe as any other type of aircraft, knew of the flaw. For misleading investors, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) fined the company $200 million and imposed a penalty of another million on its former CEO, Dennis A. Muilenburg. The FAA maintained the ban on the 737 MAX from flying until November 2020.
“No aircraft will fly again until all maintenance and safety inspections have been completed,” Alaska Airlines' Minicucci added in the statement, estimating that this would take a few days. Boeing, for its part, published a message on X in which he assures that he is investigating what happened. “We are aware of the incident involving Alaska Airlines flight #AS1282. We are working to gather more information and are in contact with our airline customer. “A Boeing technical team is ready to support the investigation.” The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) have also announced that they will investigate the case.
The 737 Max is Boeing's most popular plane and its biggest source of revenue. Single-aisle aircraft such as the Max and the corresponding Airbus SE A320neo family are most commonly used on short routes. There are about 1,200 737 Max airplanes flying, but the vast majority are of the 737 Max 8 variant, followed by the 8-200, while there are just over 200 of the variant that suffered the incident, the 737 Max 9. Alaska Air is the second largest operator of the 737 Max 9 variant, behind United Airlines, with about 80. Other airlines that operate this variant are Copa Airlines, with 29 units, and Aeroméxico, with 19. FlyDubai, which has three Boeing aircraft Max 9 said it was aware of the reports and stated that its planes have a different cabin configuration than the Alaska model, Bloomberg reports.
The 737 Max has a modular fuselage layout that allows emergency doors to be installed in a more variable manner depending on the number of seats. This provides operators with greater flexibility in cab configuration. On the 737-9 Max, Boeing includes a cabin exit door aft of the wings, but before the rear exit door. Activates in dense seating configurations to meet evacuation requirements. The doors do not activate on Alaska Airlines planes and are permanently covered, according to Bloomberg.
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