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Another Boeing plane has lost a wheel on take-off.
The news is sure focusing on it being Boeing too.
The two incidents have something else in common: United Airlines.
I'm thinking it's more likely that UAL needs to have a lugnut-day than Boeing screwed up the design of the wheels.
UAL needs to have what we called in the Navy a "Safety Stand Down"
ReplyDeleteMy brother works at Boeing, and he says that a lot of these things happen more because of the buyers than because of problems at Boeing. Particularly when you're talking Third World flag-carrier airlines---they love to save money by buying aftermarket parts, but all too often those parts aren't up to spec.
ReplyDeleteDefinitely a maintenance issue.
ReplyDeleteI would agree, it sure seems more likely that UAL has an issue with their maintenance than a design issue, considering that other airlines don't seem to be experiencing the same problems and the model of plane at least in the most recent case is one that has been in service for a long time. If there was a problem we'd have heard about it by now. On the other thing if it is just United's f-ups, you'd think that you'd see it on other types they fly because they don't just run Boeing. Of course that could be a coincidence.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, maintenance issues can pop up all of a sudden due to budget cuts... procedure changes, or sometimes just due to one individual who wasn't trained properly or is just inattentive, stupid or lazy.
I did notice that some news outlets are leading with "Boeing oh-noes" in the headlines and others are aiming more at United.
-swj