The Federal Aviation Administration of the Department of Transportation of the United States has ordered 171 Boeing 737 MAX 9 airplanes grounded worldwide after an Alaska Airlines incident on which part of the fuselage blew off of a brand new airplane during a flight.
171 Boeing 737 MAX 9 Airplanes Grounded Worldwide After Alaska Airlines Incident
The incident occurred not long after departure from Portland International Airport in Oregon on a Boeing 737 MAX 9 airplane which operated as Alaska Airlines flight 1282 on its way to Ontario in California yesterday evening, Friday, January 5, 2024. The aircraft returned to Portland and landed safely with 177 people aboard in total: 171 passengers and six members of the flight crew.
“Following tonight’s event on Flight 1282, we have decided to take the precautionary step of temporarily grounding our fleet of 65 Boeing 737-9 aircraft”, Ben Minicucci — who is the current chief executive officer of Alaska Airlines — said, according to this official statement from the airline. “Each aircraft will be returned to service only after completion of full maintenance and safety inspections. We anticipate all inspections will be completed in the next few days.”
The temporary grounding of certain Boeing 737 MAX 9 aircraft operated by airlines in the United States or in territories of the United States has been ordered by the issuance of an Emergency Airworthiness Directive that will require operators to inspect aircraft before further flights that do not meet the specified inspection cycles, according to this official statement from the Federal Aviation Administration. The required inspections will require up to eight hours per aircraft. Approximately 171 airplanes worldwide are expected to be affected by the Emergency Airworthiness Directive.
The aircraft reported had suffered from pressurization issues that caused the exit door to be blown off of the fuselage.
Brian McGuigan announced on his Twitter — er…X — account that he found the live recording of the declaration of the emergency of the flight.
I found the @liveatc recording of #ASA1282 declaring an emergency with Seattle Center around 5:12pm PT. Aircraft would have been ~12,000 ft and climbing. "Uhhhh we'd like to get down." pic.twitter.com/P8xxJ5nsbj
— Brian McGuigan (@bricaul) January 6, 2024
The FAA is requiring immediate inspections of certain Boeing 737 MAX 9 planes before they can return to flight.
This video is an Alaska Airlines flight that lost a section of wall mid flight. 👀
— Jay (@AckerlandJay) January 6, 2024
Other airlines are considering the grounding of similar aircraft in their fleets — even if they are not affected by the Emergency Airworthiness Directive — and countries such as China are considering similar actions.
Update: NTSB has launched a Go Team to Portland, Oregon to investigate an event with a Boeing 737-9 MAX during a flight from Portland to Ontario, California. No serious injuries were reported. https://t.co/VK0xF487xo
— NTSB Newsroom (@NTSB_Newsroom) January 6, 2024
Ironically, the Federal Aviation Administration officially announced only last week on Thursday, December 28, 2023 that it “is closely monitoring targeted inspections of Boeing 737 MAX airplanes to look for a possible loose bolt in the rudder control system.”
The Checkered History of the Boeing 737 MAX Airplane
The Boeing 737 MAX has had its problems over the years and is not the first time the airplane was grounded by the Federal Aviation Administration. The entire Boeing 737 MAX airplane fiasco had dragged on for months, caused two airplane crashes which resulted in hundreds of deaths, cost a substantial amount of money, and cast the reputation of safety of the aviation company in a bad light in the public eye.
The Federal Aviation Administration had ordered the temporary grounding of Boeing 737 MAX airplanes which were operated by airlines in the United States or its territories effective as of Wednesday, March 13, 2019 at 3:00 in the afternoon after two crashes occurred.
A Boeing 737-8 MAX aircraft — which operated as Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 from Addis Ababa to Nairobi — crashed approximately six minutes after takeoff on Sunday, March 10, 2019 at 8:38 in the morning; and no survivors had been reported among the 149 passengers or eight members of the flight crew. The airplane was relatively new, as its inaugural flight occurred on Tuesday, October 30, 2018.
Only one day before that aforementioned inaugural flight, another Boeing 737-800 MAX airplane — which operated as Lion Air flight 610 from Jakarta to Pangkal Pinang as a domestic flight within Indonesia — crashed into the Java Sea approximately 35 nautical miles northeast of Jakarta on the morning of Monday, October 29, 2018 at 6:33 local time and killed all 181 passengers and eight members of the flight crew who were aboard.
The order of grounding the Boeing 737 MAX airplane was officially rescinded on the morning of Wednesday, November 18, 2020 following what was referred to as the completion of greater than 20 months of a comprehensive and methodical safety review process, which is a major impediment that was removed in order for the beleaguered airplane to return to commercial aviation service.
As a result, The Boeing Company entered into an official deferred prosecution agreement with the Department of Justice of the United States to resolve a criminal charge — which is related to a conspiracy to defraud the Aircraft Evaluation Group of the Federal Aviation Administration of the United States in connection with its evaluation of the Boeing 737 MAX airplane — by agreeing to pay a total of greater than $2.5 billion back in January of 2021.
Final Boarding Call
Investigations are ongoing as to exactly what happened aboard the Boeing 737 MAX 9 airplane which operated as Alaska Airlines flight 1282. Thankfully, no fatalities or serious injuries were reported as a result of this incident, whose outcome could have potentially been significantly worse.
I am not sure what happened to the quality control of airplanes that are manufactured by The Boeing Company — but it needs to be substantially improved as soon as possible to help prevent incidents such as this one from occurring in the future. Perhaps a broader investigation of the company itself and the government entities which are directly associated with it is needed…?
Photograph ©2018 by Brian Cohen.
