Alaska Airlines ground its plane after a window blew out on a flight

An investigation of the plane’s crash-induced nose-diving caused by an engine nacelle: The Seattle Times reports that Boeing had violated FAA safety regulations

The Seattle Times reported yesterday that the FAA has received a petition from Boeing to exempt the smaller plane from its safety regulations. The plane apparently has a defect that could cause an engine nacelle to break up. The article says that if the pilots decide to turn off the plane’s anti-ice system, it won’t damage the nacelle, since it’s the same defect as the existing737 Max planes. Boeing said that the nacelle break down was “impossible in its petition”.

“The FAA is requiring immediate inspections of certain Boeing 737 MAX 9 planes before they can return to flight,” the agency’s administrator Mike Whitaker said in a statement.

The New York Times reported yesterday that flight 1282 from Portland International Airport had made an emergency landing back at the same airport just 20 minutes later because of a “pressurization issue” that resulted in a wall of the plane blowing out. According to the Times, only minor injuries were reported when the seat disappeared, and nobody was immediately next to the wall. A teenage passenger’s shirt was pulled off by the sudden depressurization.

In 2021, Boeing agreed to pay more than $2.5 billion to settle a criminal charge related to the crashes. The Boeing was ordered to pay a total of $246 million for the crimes it committed and $500 million for the families who died in the crashes. Much of the rest of the settlement was marked off for airlines that had purchased the troubled 737 Max planes.

But it wasn’t just manufacturing flaws. According to the report, the company failed to tell regulators about the changes it made to its flight control system. The report concluded that Boeing did this to speed the certification process.

The investigators found that the new flight control system was to blame. The system known asMCAS forced two planes to nose dive even though the pilots tried to regain control.

The aircraft’s safety problems were under global scrutiny after deadly crashes in Indonesia in 2018 and Ethiopia in 2019 — which killed a total of 346 people. In December 2020, Boeing began its first US commercial flight with the 737 Max.

Alaska Airlines flight #1 was forced to make a emergency landing in Portland, OR on Friday night. Along with the FAA, the National Transportation Safety Board is also investigating the incident.

The aircraft returned to Portland International Airport after the plane’s oxygen masks were put on. The flight had passengers and crew on board. No casualties or serious injuries were reported.

Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 took off from Portland, Ore., shortly after 5 p.m. PST Friday, bound for Ontario, Calif. The social media posts said that a window and piece of the plane had broken and left a gaping hole on the left side.

The MAX -8 and -7 aircraft in our fleet do not have the exit door plug, which is needed for the Friday evening event. Our fleet and operation are unaffected,” a Southwest spokesperson said in a statement.

Southwest Airlines and American Airlines told NPR they do not carry Boeing 737 The number 9s. While they do carry Boeing 737 Max 8s, both airlines said the model does not raise any concerns.

The Alaska Airlines 737-9 Jet – An Emergency Landing Driven by a Window and a Blowout in Portland, Or

Last year, the FAA told pilots to limit use of an anti-ice system on the Max in dry conditions because of concern that inlets around the engines could overheat and break away, possibly striking the plane.

The Max is the newest version of Boeing’s venerable 737, a twin-engine, single-aisle plane frequently used on U.S. domestic flights. The plane was put into service in May.

The plane had been on 145 flights since entering commercial service on Nov. 11, said FlightRadar24, another tracking service. The flight from Portland was the aircraft’s third of the day.

The passenger sent the picture to KATU-TV in Portland, which showed the hole in the side of the plane. People wearing oxygen masks and clapping on a plane are shown in video shared by the station.

The pilot told Portland air traffic controllers the plane had an emergency, was depressurized and needed to return to the airport, according to a recording made by the website LiveATC.net.

The plane was diverted about about six minutes after taking off at 5:07 p.m., according to flight tracking data from the FlightAware website. At 5:26 pm, it made it’s landing.

Each of the aircraft will be returned to service after full maintenance and safety inspections, which Minicucci said the airline anticipated completing within days.

Alaska Airlines grounded all of its Boeing 737-9 aircraft late Friday, hours after a window and piece of fuselage on one such plane blew out in midair and forced an emergency landing in Portland, Oregon.