TRANS FAA grounds Boeing 737 Max 9 planes for mandatory door plug inspections, Post #82 DOJ Opens Criminal Investigation Post# 103 Whistleblower Dead

[Macgyver]

FAA grounds Boeing 737 Max 9 planes for mandatory inspections - Washington Examiner

The Federal Aviation Administration ordered Boeing 737 Max 9 planes to be temporarily grounded on Saturday. The administration also issued an emergency airworthiness directive for the planes, which will require "immediate inspections" on the aircraft before they're allowed in the air again. The...

www.washingtonexaminer.com

FAA grounds Boeing 737 Max 9 planes for mandatory inspections​

The Federal Aviation Administration ordered Boeing 737 Max 9 planes to be temporarily grounded on Saturday.

The administration also issued an emergency airworthiness directive for the planes, which will require "immediate inspections" on the aircraft before they're allowed in the air again. The directive will instruct operators on what to look out for to ensure the safety of passengers.


"The required inspections will take around four to eight hours per aircraft," the FAA explained in a statement. "The EAD will affect approximately 171 airplanes worldwide."

"Safety will always be the top priority for our Department and for FAA," Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in a statement. "Administrator Whitaker has acted to order these aircraft grounded pending the inspections necessary to ensure that they are safe to operate."

This announcement comes after Alaska Airlines Flight 1282, a Boeing 737 Max 9, was forced to return to its takeoff destination when one of its windows was blown off mid-flight. The window was discovered to be blown out within an hour of its takeoff, and it delayed passengers flying to Ontario, California. Flight 1282 was cited in the FAA's announcement.

Boeing's affected planes are the updated version of the 737 Max, which is the most commonly flown plane in the world. The ninth version boasts a new fuel-efficient engine that runs quieter and purports lower carbon emissions. It seats 178 passengers.

It remains to be seen what caused the damage to the window. There have been no reported injuries

(I added "door plug" to the thread title. RB)

 

[bw]

The window was discovered to be blown out within an hour of its takeoff,

Like they just noticed. "Oh look, the window's gone. Miss, could I have some more peanuts?"

I think they probably mean the window blew out about an hour out, and it was discovered Right F_ Now.

 

[jward]

It was some cray cray video- and these days, that is saying something

 

[1911user]

It wasn't just a window, it was an optional door that blew out at 16,000 feet.

 

[bw]

It wasn't just a window, it was an optional door that blew out at 16,000 feet.

Now that would get my immediate attention even if I were sitting three or four seats away.

 

[Red Baron]

Boeing has some serious organizational issues that keep cropping up.

 

[ktrapper]

It wasn't just a window, it was an optional door that blew out at 16,000 feet.

Note to self. Book Aisle seats from now on.
I have been on the Max 9 quite a few times back and forth to Alaska.

To begin with I could look and see what plane I was booking for. I always booked on a Winglets 737 not the Max.
Doesnt matter now, Max is used whenever they deem it now anyway.

 

[ivantherussian03]

Kinda scary…I have ridden that aircraft with my family.

 

[1911user]

Note to self. Book Aisle seats from now on.
I have been on the Max 9 quite a few times back and forth to Alaska.

To begin with I could look and see what plane I was booking for. I always booked on a Winglets 737 not the Max.
Doesnt matter now, Max is used whenever they deem it now anyway.

When I flew for business in the past it was almost exclusively on Southwest. They only flew 737s. I was normally able to get my preferred window seat in the middle to the back of the plane. There was no assigned seating on Southwest.

I knew from experience that there were only a few rows where the windows were just ahead of the seat back. Those had extra shoulder room! I would go directly to one of them, quickly stow luggage, put in ear plugs, lean my head and shoulder into the window cutout, then take a nap for the flight. It's scary how close this blowout occurred to where I would have normally been sitting.

 

[jward]

 

[Hfcomms]

Note to self. Book Aisle seats from now on.

And keep your belts fastened. Several years back a window in a Southwest 737 blew out and sucked a lady out the window to her death. Explosive decompression will take everything out the hole until the pressure equalizes. Good thing they were still in their initial climb out and everyone was still belted in. If it happened at cruise not only would people have died but that big of a hole at 35,000 feet might have compromised the structural integrity of the airframe as well.

 

[Old Greek]

I wonder how many DEI employees now work at Boeing? Including younger DEI pilots working for the airlines. I will stick to driving where I want to go. JMHO!

 

[Millwright]

Alaska Airlines is upgrading the drop-down safety gear for the passengers.

 

[Mark D]

Boeing has some serious organizational issues that keep cropping up.

Yes, Boeing has some issues. This Door mod isn't one of them.

 

[turtlegent]

I have a relative flying for alaska, he says all 65 of the planes are grounded. Southwest flies the same plane, and because they have over 200 passenger seating, they have to have the emergency door. Alaska has two classes, and less the 180 passenger seats, so no extra door, and no door handles. The extra door is for emergency slide exit.

 

[Shadow]

I have a relative flying for alaska, he says all 65 of the planes are grounded. Southwest flies the same plane, and because they have over 200 passenger seating, they have to have the emergency door. Alaska has two classes, and less the 180 passenger seats, so no extra door, and no door handles. The extra door is for emergency slide exit.

Southwest has no max-900's. They have max-800's with 175 passengers capacity.

Boeing 737-900 Operators

Shadow

 

[AlfaMan]

It wasn't just a window, it was an optional door that blew out at 16,000 feet.

So, was that blocked off door riveted to the airframe or bonded using adhesive to the airframe?

The blowout was so clean! Had to have been bonded, pointing to a improper cure on the bonding process.

 

[medic38572]

From a friend that works at Alaska Airlines!

 

[Millwright]

Lower picture, looks likes some structural damage, maybe?

Torn skin?

Almost like the whole tail section is drooping?

Hard to tell with that pic.

 

[Millwright]

Gobs of discussion at Airliners.net.

Almost 800 posts.

AS1282 PDX-ONT decompression event, returned to PDX, FAA temporarily grounds 737MAX9 for inspections - Airliners.net

 

[Red Baron]

The hidden door/plug blew out at around 16,000 feet.

Questions

Where is the door?

What part of the door or door frame actually failed?

Where are the parts that failed?

What was the failure mode?

What precipitated the failure?

How does one do an inspection on existing doors if one doesn't know what they are looking for?

 

[Countrymouse]

The hidden door/plug blew out at around 16,000 feet.

Questions

Where is the door?

What part of the door or door frame actually failed?

Where are the parts that failed?

What was the failure mode?

What precipitated the failure?

How does one do an inspection on existing doors if one doesn't know what they are looking for?

Actually heard on news that the FAA is asking people to "look for" the door.

So they can, you know, "investigate" it, when they find it.


God help us.

 

[Masterphreak]

Actually heard on news that the FAA is asking people to "look for" the door.

So they can, you know, "investigate" it, when they find it.


God help us.

Finding the door or pieces of it can greatly aid in determining what went wrong. Unfortunately, it is likely in some forested area and might get found by a hunter someday. Since the door opens inward it means the door plug failed in some way for it to have departed the aircraft.

It is either a design or manufacturing defect. Manufacturing defects only affect certain airplanes made on certain dates. Design defects could affect the entire fleet.

Since it has a normal-sized window installed in the plug door it creates a stress point. If it wasn't properly reinforced it would fail after so many cycles. Since there are reports of pressurization issues on this aircraft on previous flights, it sounds likely that this was a slow cracking around the window frame leading to catastrophic failure.

 

[night driver]

Perfectly reasonable request for public help, here.

+What Masterphreak said.

 

[mzkitty]

Read the rest of the comments here:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1744223495964287459

View: https://twitter.com/rawsalerts/status/1744223495964287459

 

[Red Baron]

View attachment 454496
View attachment 454497

Read the rest of the comments here:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1744223495964287459

View: https://twitter.com/rawsalerts/status/1744223495964287459

I'm getting a sense of institutional dysfunction starting to rear it's ugly little head.

- The plane was brand new and delivered at the end of October.

- Multiple occasions of a cabin pressure warning light coming on but no reason found for the light coming on.

- Cockpit voice recorder overwritten losing all event communications within the airplane.

- Some questions now as to how long it took to land the plane.

I worry this could be one those situations where everyone supposedly did what they were supposed to do, but a very serious event nearly occurred regardless.

 

[mzkitty]

I'm getting a sense of institutional dysfunction starting to rear it's ugly little head.

- The plane was brand new and delivered at the end of October.

- Multiple occasions of a cabin pressure warning light coming on but no reason found for the light coming on.

- Cockpit voice recorder overwritten losing all event communications within the airplane.

- Some questions now as to how long it took to land the plane.

I worry this could be one those situations where everyone supposedly did what they were supposed to do, but a very serious event nearly occurred regardless.

Yup. A nightmare. Scares me for sure.

 

[Raffy]

I'm a structural engineer working in the aerospace industry (granted, more in the "space" part of the industry rather than the "aero" part), and I'd say that the failure was caused by a design issue, an installation issue, a material quality issue, or some combination of those. If it were an installation issue, there would have to be gross negligence by one or more airframe and powerplant (A&P) mechanics, either during aircraft assembly at the factory or maintenance thereafter and such would have to involve failing to attach fasteners properly to hold the door plug in place. It's possible that poor quality materials also contributed. Or it could be that poor design practices were used. Hopefully the investigation will unveil the true cause of the failure, even without recovering the door plug that fell off.

Typically most passenger airliners are pressurized to an equivalent altitude of roughly 7000 feet, or the pressure one would experience outside at 7000 feet above mean sea level or MSL (this varies between aircraft, newer jetliners like the 787 are pressurized to about 6000 feet). Assuming that the 737 MAX is pressurized to about 6000 feet MSL, that would mean an internal pressure of about 11.7psi. External air pressure at 16000 feet (where the failure occurred) is about 8 psi. So there's a delta pressure of about 3.7 psi between the cabin and the outside at 16000 ft. If the door plug is roughly 4 ft x 3 ft (rough guess on my part), my calculations would show that the outward pushing force on the door plug would be more than 5000 lb. Keep in mind that this is a rough back of the envelope type calculation and I don't have access to the 737 MAX design details. That sounds like a lot, but it can easily be handled by a properly chosen pattern of multiple aerospace grade fasteners of the proper size. Joints like this are always designed to be redundant, so that if one fastener fails, the rest of them can still take the load and keep the part from coming off. Or at least they're designed that way where I come from, LOL! But with today's "woke" culture in many companies today, who knows?!

It will be really interesting to find out the real cause of this failure. At this point, I would lean towards poor quality materials of some sort (either in the door plug itself, or the fasteners/attach hardware). Just an educated guess at this point, though...

 

[1911user]

They have found the blown out door plug. It was in someone's yard.

 

[Millwright]

Joints like this are always designed to be redundant, so that if one fastener fails, the rest of them can still take the load and keep the part from coming off.

The inside cabin picture ain't great, but I didn't see any torn out fasteners.

Is that panel stuck on with some kind of pookie?

Lotsa adhesives being used in the industry now.

ETA: Not seeing any in the picture below either.

 

[mzkitty]

Doesn't say where.

 

[mzkitty]

Apparently they found it in Portland, Oregon.

La puerta de emergencia fue encontrada en Portland, Oregón.

NTSB localiza la puerta (door plug) del avión de Alaska Airlines en el jardín de un maestro

Recuperación de la puerta de emergencia del Boeing 737-9 MAX de Alaska Airlines por la NTSB. Resumen La NTSB localizó la puerta de emergencia del Boeing 737-9 MAX de Alaska Airlines en Portland, Or…

www.transponder1200.com

 

[Raffy]

The inside cabin picture ain't great, but I didn't see any torn out fasteners.

Is that panel stuck on with some kind of pookie?

Lotsa adhesives being used in the industry now.

ETA: Not seeing any in the picture below either.

Hmm... Maybe that's part of the problem. If they didn't use any mechanical fasteners to hold that plug in place, I'd consider that to be a design flaw. But really, they must have somewhere, if for no other reason than to make it easier to remove the plug and replace it with a door if the airline decided they needed to change the seating configuration for that plane. It would be a lot more difficult to dissolve adhesive to remove that plug.

It's a good thing that plug didn't land on someone's roof or go through a window - or hit a vehicle.

 

[Raffy]

Doesn't say where.

View attachment 454604
View attachment 454605

Per the Epoch Times, it was found in a teacher's backyard:​

​

​

Missing Alaska Airlines Door Plug Found in Portland Backyard​

A schoolteacher in Portland had contacted the NTSB after discovering the missing part of the aircraft in his backyard.


By Aldgra Fredly
1/8/2024
Updated:
1/8/2024


0:00




A missing door plug that blew off an Alaska Airlines plane in mid-air on Friday has been recovered in the backyard of a Portland home, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said on Sunday.
Speaking at a press conference on Jan. 7, NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy said the missing Boeing 737 Max 9 door plug was found in the backyard of a Portland schoolteacher who was only identified as Bob.
“I’m excited to announce that we found the door plug. Thank you, Bob,” Ms. Homendy told reporters.



Story continues below advertisement



AD


According to Ms. Homendy, the schoolteacher contacted the NTSB after discovering the missing part of the aircraft in his backyard and sent two photos of it. Ms. Homendy refused to disclose any details about the location.
“We’re going to go pick that up and make sure that we begin analyzing it,” she added.
Investigators had been looking for the plug that blew off the plane after takeoff from Portland, Oregon, en route to Ontario, California, on Friday, prompting the pilots to make an emergency landing.
Related Stories
What to Know About the Alaska Airlines 737 Max 9 Jet That Suffered a Blowout
1/7/2024

Alaska Airlines Again Grounds All Boeing 737 Max 9 Jetliners as More Maintenance May Be Needed
1/7/2024

The airplane, carrying 171 passengers and six crew members, safely returned to Portland International Airport and landed at approximately 5:30 p.m. local time on Friday, according to Alaska Airlines.
The airline said on Sunday that it was willing to conduct inspections of the mid exit door plugs on its 737-9 MAX fleet. Alaska Airlines has canceled hundreds of flights following the incident.
“While we await the airworthiness directive (AD) inspection criteria from the FAA and Boeing, our maintenance teams are prepared and ready to perform the required inspections of the mid exit door plugs on our 737-9 MAX fleet,” the airline stated.
“The 737-9 MAX grounding has significantly impacted our operation. We have cancelled 170 Sunday flights and 60 cancellations for Monday, with more expected,” it said.

NTSB Called for Public’s Help​

The NTSB had earlier requested the public’s help in locating the missing plug, as the agency believed it could be a “key missing component” that would help determine the cause of the accident.
“Our structures team will want to look at everything on the door—all of the components on the door to see to look at witness marks, to look at any paint transfer, what shape the door was in when found. That can tell them a lot about what occurred,” Ms. Homendy said.
She said the force from the loss of the plug door was strong enough to blow open the cockpit door during flight.



Story continues below advertisement



AD


“They heard a bang,” Ms. Homendy said of the pilots, who were interviewed by investigators.
A quick reference laminated checklist flew out the door, while the first officer lost her headset, she said.
“Communication was a serious issue... It was described as chaos,” she added.
Ms. Homendy said the cockpit voice recorder did not capture any data because it had been overwritten and again called on regulators to mandate retrofitting existing planes with recorders that capture 25 hours of data, up from the two hours required at present.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has ordered the grounding of some Boeing Max 9s operated by U.S. airlines or flown into the country by foreign carriers until they are inspected. The emergency order affects about 171 planes worldwide.
The so-called door plug is installed on some jets with fewer seats instead of an emergency exit panel. The jets ordered grounded by the FAA all have those panels installed.
United Airlines, the world’s biggest operator of Max 9s, grounded its entire fleet of 79 Max 9s and is seeking to “clarify the inspection process and requirements for returning” them to service. United said it canceled 90 flights because of the grounding Saturday and about 180 Sunday.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Missing Alaska Airlines Door Plug Found in Portland Backyard

A schoolteacher in Portland had contacted the NTSB after discovering the missing part of the aircraft in his backyard.

www.theepochtimes.com

​

 

[Hfcomms]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEh71lT08hI


5min RT

ATC communications and you can tell the co-pilot who was handling the radio was on a mask and yeah, she sounded rattled.

 

[Macgyver]

Just fwi, this isn't an operable door.

Essentially the fuselage is built with a spot for another door. That only needs to be a door if the plane is configured with high density seating. X number of people require so many doors. Alaska's seating configuration does not require a door.

That's why they keep calling it a plug.
Interior of the plane covers right over it.

 

[Macgyver]

What's interesting to me is that it failed at 16k feet. I thought most planes were pressurized to around 10k.
That's not a huge pressure difference.
Difference would have been much greater on the previous flight that could have been 30-35 feet.

 

[kytom]

united airlines finds loose bolts on 5 aircraft. article below. it wont let me copy and paste!

United finds loose bolts on plug doors during 737 Max 9 inspections

United Airlines has found loose bolts and other parts on 737 Max 9 plug doors as it inspects its fleet of Boeing jets following the Friday rapid depressurization aboard an Alaska Airlines jet of the same make, according to three people familiar with the findings.

theaircurrent.com

 

[Red Baron]

Fair Use Cited
----------------
Breaking: United Finds Loose Bolts on Boeing 737 MAX 9 Aircraft Plug Doors

Youssef Yahya
08/01/2024

United Airlines, one of the world’s largest operators of the Boeing 737 MAX 9, has recently discovered several loose bolts in the door plug installations on some of its aircraft. This revelation comes in the wake of a serious incident involving an Alaska Airlines 737 MAX 9, where an emergency exit door plug was blown out mid-flight, leading to the grounding of the aircraft model by the FAA and other global aviation authorities.

In response to the FAA’s grounding and subsequent directive for immediate inspections, United Airlines proactively began examining its fleet of 79 Boeing 737 MAX 9 aircraft. The inspection process, involving a team of skilled technicians, entailed meticulous checks of the door plug installations, including the removal of interior panels and seats, and a thorough examination of the door frame hardware and seals. Despite not receiving official clearance from the FAA to resume operations, United Airlines’ early inspections have already uncovered installation anomalies, including inadequately tightened bolts, which the airline has committed to rectifying.

The door plug issue has had significant ramifications globally, with the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and India’s Aviation Authority following the FAA’s lead in grounding the 737 MAX 9 fleet and demanding inspections. The discovery of these installation flaws has raised questions about the safety and reliability of this aircraft variant, spurring regulatory bodies worldwide to take swift action to ensure passenger safety.

The origins of this widespread concern can be traced back to the January 5 incident involving Alaska Airlines flight N704AL. This aircraft had reportedly experienced auto pressurization failure multiple times in the month preceding the emergency, leading to restrictions on its operational range. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has since recovered the blown-off door plug and is conducting a thorough investigation, examining various components to determine the root cause of the incident.

Breaking: United Finds Loose Bolts on Boeing 737 MAX 9 Aircraft Plug Doors - Aviation for Aviators

United Airlines has recently discovered several loose bolts in the door plug installations on some of their Boeing 737 MAX 9.

aviationforaviators.com

 

[Red Baron]

Edward Russell
@ByERussell

New memo to @united pilots outlining its Boeing 737 Max 9 door plug inspection process, and aim to return the aircraft to service in the "next several days". https://skift.com/2024/01/08/alaska-and-united-may-see-little-financial-hit-from-737-max-9-grounding/