A United Airlines flight that took off from San Francisco International Airport Friday morning landed in Oregon with a missing external panel, according to officials.
United says the missing panel wasn’t discovered until the plane landed safely in Medford and that pilots had no idea during the flight that something had happened.
Let me guess. Boeing
Edit: yep Boeing 737-800
The tire falling off doesn’t feel like a Boeing thing. At least on smaller aircraft, it’s a pin that holds it on. It feels like a United maintenance issue
It’s getting old how everyone seems to think that Boeing does all maintenance for all airlines. In what world would that make sense
The same world where McDonald’s contracts with a single company for all the maintenance on their ice cream machines nationwide.
Yes, it would be more analogous if it was United contracting a single company for all their maintenance. For really big companies, it’s not unusual for them to have one contract with another big company to handle a certain thing at all their locations. For example, custodial services, truck maintenance, stuff like that. Aircraft maintenance seems reasonable.
And it’s also possible that Boeing says “if you want us to work with us, you must use our approved maintenance contractor(s), otherwise you’re on your own”, and United certainly has the money for it.
But that’s an educated guess. For a factual point, remember that Boeing writes the maintenance manuals. If they write a manual that says “use grade N bolts”, and grade N bolts aren’t actually sufficient, the maintainer is still going to use grade N because that’s what the manual says. And Boeing accountants and middle managers wouldn’t really overrule the metallurgical engineer to save a couple cents on each bolt, would they? Nahhhhh.
That is not how it works for aircraft.
At least in general aviation, there is a maximum number of hours for certain parts that need to be overhauled. The engine installed onto a given aircraft may be designed by Rolls Royce or it may be designed by GE or it may be designed by Pratt and Whitney. Boeing doesn’t have expertise in it all.
Furthermore, each aircraft must maintain an airworthiness certificate. This is one of the ways the FAA can ground planes. For example, it can ground all planes of a given type until required maintenance is performed on a faulty part. Unfortunately, I’m not sure how the airworthiness certificate is determined for Boeing aircraft. I think the FAA has historically given great latitude to Boeing to certify their own aircraft.
HOWEVER, the A&P mechanic (airframe and powerplant) is responsible for maintenance. This license requires examination from the FAA. Some FBOs can maintain A&P, but usually the airline maintains its own aircraft (hence why either southwest or american has such a bad reputation).
The 737-800 has been in service for quite a while and its a proven platform. The only reason the 737-MAX is having issues is because they wanted to take the proven 737 platform and add a stupid design design to complete with the A320. If there really IS such a big issue with their manual, the FAA will step in and issue a directive. They have not done so for the 737-800. This is united’s issue.
Here you can search for the airworthiness directives for the 737-800: https://drs.faa.gov/search
One in 2001 and one in 2007.
So, the Alaska Airlines door plug incident is more than likely Boeing’s fault(we don’t have the footage or a record of who did the repair because Boeing deleted/lost it…which makes me even more suspicious tbh), but this was a 25yr old 737-800 Boeing hasn’t seen in decades. This looks like a united maintenance issue as do all the other united 737 issues.
Now, don’t get me wrong, Boeing definitely has a plethora of issues going on, but I think the FAA might want to also look into United’s maintenance department as well cause they’re also having a plethora of issues.
I was in a skydiving school one time when their twin otter came back with a piece of plywood stuck in the tail. While looking at the tail one guy said “what are the odds of that; that we would be flying around and hit that random piece of plywood that’s up there in the sky.” I had to explain that there weren’t just random pieces of plywood up in the sky and they needed to look over the airplane to see where that came from. Turns out the emergency hatch on the top had delaminated. The interior panel was still in place but the exterior panel was gone and this plywood piece had stuck in the vertical stabilizer.
I’ve never been afraid to fly because it was routine since I was a child. For the first time in my life, I’m apprehensive about it. Great job, corporations. And let’s not forget capitalism. The ever-present race for profits has a big role to play here.
That’s it. I’m getting off Lemmy to play a video game and forget about this stupid world. See you folks later.
Boeing has threatened to shoot the person who finds the panel.
I mean, send condolences to their family.
Boeing - the full service casket company
If it is Boeing, I ain’t going
Bro I am supposed to travel overseas and now I’m super nervous about a longaul on a Boeing
Complain to the airline, have everyone you know complain to the airline, they are the customers of Boeing, so make them understand your conserns
You’ll still be fine. These are singular cases we hear about, especially now when Boeing is ripe for some more kicking things get hyped up and shared, to what is essentially thousands of flight hours every day their planes make. Overall their safety record is not even close to bad.
Comparatively, it’s definitely bad.
But air travel is still far safer than driving.
Still think they should look into submarines since they are really struggling with the whole going up thing.
“How many atmospheres can this thing withstand?”
“Well it’s an aircraft, so somewhere between 0 and 1”
I don’t understand why the media isn’t focusing more on United airlines maintenance issues, and still hammering on Boeing. I mean, Boeing deserves all the criticism, but a lot of the Boeing plane issues in the news recently are all old ones flown by United.
Because “clicks”
I have two trips in the next month. Fingers crossed the FAA grounds all the Boeing stock.
Missing a panel? Like the kind that usually stay on? That almost sounds like a quality control problem hmmmm
Let me guess, Boeing plane.
Seems like more maintenance issue than Boeing’s fault. Boeing make unsafe planes and then United don’t maintain them, so who’s to blame?
If Boeing’s planes don’t kill you, their assassins will.
Is United in on it?
Probably.
