Alaska and united max9 meltdown

[Obdave]

Anyone else facing flight cancellations for cruises this month.  We’re booked on Alaska Jan 26 from boi-sfo-Tpa for a cruise embarking the 27th.  Rumors are that all max9 flights will be grounded into February.  Both united and Alaska are cancelling flights day by day with less than 24 hours warning.  Highly recommend one books a refundable back up flight asap as rebooking day before or (shudders) day of might lead to missing the ship.  We found a delta flight arriving at midnight that we booked with miles just in case.  I think southwest has refundable fares but prices are going to climb and availability shrink with so many planes grounded.

[Va4fam]

Sorry about your flights.  Good idea to have backup flights.   We are flying Alaska in March and hope they have it sorted out by then   

 

[Obdave]

As feared my flight to Tampa was cancelled with 36 hours notice. Alaska stated in the cancellation notice that no alternative flights are available. Strongly urge anyone with an Alaska or united flight to have a backup in place. Looks like the max9 grounding will run well into February and maybe longer

[smokeybandit]

The FAA is playing games with Boeing. They know this is an isolated incident, otherwise they'd have grounded the 737-900 fleet, too.

[WAYNO]

59 minutes ago, Obdave said:

As feared my flight to Tampa was cancelled with 36 hours notice. Alaska stated in the cancellation notice that no alternative flights are available. Strongly urge anyone with an Alaska or united flight to have a backup in place. Looks like the max9 grounding will run well into February and maybe longer

I am sorry for this.  Please keep us posted on how you are handling this or an alternative.

We leave PDX for Miami in a week.

[Obdave]

Wayno, I booked a refundable delta flight boi-Atl-tpa  three weeks ago as a backup.  The flight gets into Tampa at midnight but at least we’ll get there. Alaska has refunded our flight but without a backup we’d be paying through the nose for a flight with three or four legs. I’d suggest you look into doing the same. I was tipped off that our flight wouldn’t get an equipment swap when they quit selling tickets earlier this week when there were still empty seats

[twangster]

1 hour ago, smokeybandit said:

The FAA is playing games with Boeing. They know this is an isolated incident, otherwise they'd have grounded the 737-900 fleet, too.

I thought they expanded inspections to include the 900ER that uses the same door plug as the MAX9.  

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna134986
 

The Boeing 737-900ER is used by Alaska, Delta and a number of overseas airlines. It is older than the 737 Max 9 involved in the Alaska Airlines flight, but it uses the same door plug design, the FAA said. 

There are 380 of the 737-900ER planes in service worldwide, a source familiar with the matter told NBC News. Boeing said in a statement on the inspections: "We fully support the FAA and our customers in this action."

[smokeybandit]

1 minute ago, twangster said:

I thought they expanded inspections to include the 900ER that uses the same door plug as the MAX9.  

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna134986
 

The Boeing 737-900ER is used by Alaska, Delta and a number of overseas airlines. It is older than the 737 Max 9 involved in the Alaska Airlines flight, but it uses the same door plug design, the FAA said. 

There are 380 of the 737-900ER planes in service worldwide, a source familiar with the matter told NBC News. Boeing said in a statement on the inspections: "We fully support the FAA and our customers in this action."

Yes, they recommend that the -900ER owners do inspections. But they didn't ground them.

[Geezer Of The Seas]

Boeing really seems to have lost their way in aircraft and aerospace. The plane issues have gotten plenty of press, but the return to the moon is years behind and billions over budget. Boeing's Starliner capsule won't be flying anytime soon with a crew because the ablatative heat shield................well, abalated more than the engineers anticipated. There's also an issue with the parachute system and the life support system. Other than that....................

[smokeybandit]

The affected MAX 9s can fly again

 

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/faa-says-boeing-737-max-9-planes-can-return-service-after-inspections-2024-01-24/

[twangster]

33 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

The affected MAX 9s can fly again

 

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/faa-says-boeing-737-max-9-planes-can-return-service-after-inspections-2024-01-24/

Nearly two weeks later and with hundreds of thousands of passengers impacted, including me with an unexpected stay in a hub city recently. Better than dead I guess.  

[smokeybandit]

Alaska plans to return their MAX 9s to service starting Friday.

[RCIfan1912]

My question is would you even want to fly on this plane? Boeing is extremely disappointing. They have been, and still should be the pride of the nation. Honestly, an embarrassment lately. They are anti union which is where this all stems from. Meanwhile Airbus is not anti union and is not having these stupid issues. 

[smokeybandit]

57 minutes ago, RCIfan1912 said:

My question is would you even want to fly on this plane? Boeing is extremely disappointing. They have been, and still should be the pride of the nation. Honestly, an embarrassment lately. They are anti union which is where this all stems from. Meanwhile Airbus is not anti union and is not having these stupid issues. 

My question is why not? Issues happen on every plane type every day. Just the FAA likes to magnify anything that happens to a Boeing plane. Just this week a nearly brand new Airbus A321 blew an engine leaving Chicago. Yet no grounding, no national news.

[RCIfan1912]

3 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

My question is why not? Issues happen on every plane type every day. Just the FAA likes to magnify anything that happens to a Boeing plane. Just this week a nearly brand new Airbus A321 blew an engine leaving Chicago. Yet no grounding, no national news.

Issues like not telling the airline about a new system that forces the plane into the ground because the pilots who are gonna fly these planes how to use this system or understand how it works? That's a minor issue? That's a regular new plane issue? Just 500 people had to die to figure that one out. Boeing has been a disappointment and an embarrassment over the last decade. 

Doors flying off because they aren't bolted correctly is not normal or indictive of a company on top of things. It reeks of a company cutting corners. 

[smokeybandit]

4 minutes ago, RCIfan1912 said:

Issues like not telling the airline about a new system that forces the plane into the ground because the pilots who are gonna fly these planes how to use this system or understand how it works? That's a minor issue? That's a regular new plane issue? Just 500 people had to die to figure that one out. Boeing has been a disappointment and an embarrassment over the last decade. 

Doors flying off because they aren't bolted correctly is not normal or indictive of a company on top of things. It reeks of a company cutting corners. 

Incidents happen to all plane types. Sounds like you should drive to port next time. Then again cars get recalled all the time, too, for safety issues. Better just walk.

[RCIfan1912]

3 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

Incidents happen to all plane types. Sounds like you should drive to port next time. Then again cars get recalled all the time, too, for safety issues. Better just walk.

Again you are not getting it. You think not telling the airline or the pilots about a brand new system that causes the plane to crash because those pilots were trained on the system is normal growing pains for a new plane? 

Let me know the next time a car is recalled that killed 600 people in a span of a month. 

I don't know why you are getting so defensive about Boeing. There have been documentaries on what is going on over there. It's not good. 

[smokeybandit]

This is about saying "I'm not flying in that plane" because of one isolated incident.

MCAS was its own issue and Boeing paid dearly for that. But with better trained pilots, despite what Boeing did with MCAS, there wouldn't have been any crashes. 

[RCIfan1912]

1 minute ago, smokeybandit said:

This is about saying "I'm not flying in that plane" because of one isolated incident.

MCAS was its own issue and Boeing paid dearly for that. But with better trained pilots, despite what Boeing did with MCAS, there wouldn't have been any crashes. 

I did not say "I'm not flying on that plane". I asked would you still want to. 

It's not one isolated incident. 2 planes fell out of the sky and killed 500 people because the pilots were not trained to use the system. That was because the lousy execs didn't want the airlines to have to give pilots already flying the 737 training on a brand new system. 

Now a door flys off the plane so that passengers are looking at the ground and sky because bolts were secured. This is literally straight out of the Simpsons where it's a big joke. 

[RCIfan1912]

This is the guy to listen to on this. He's a 777 airline pilot. He knows what he is talking about. 

 

 

[twangster]

1 hour ago, smokeybandit said:

But with better trained pilots, despite what Boeing did with MCAS, there wouldn't have been any crashes. 

Boeing desperately wanted the MAX to share the type rating with some previous 737 types so that pilots wouldn't need to be specifically trained and type rated for the MAX.   The idea was that pilots who flew other 737 could walk into the cockpit of a MAX and fly it with minimal if any training required.    This would help sell the MAX to airlines that already had 737s in their fleets.

In hindsight it's clear that should not have been allowed.  Boeing should have been required to create a new type rating for the MAX.  That would have led to more pilot training including on MCAS.  

[smokeybandit]

No airline would have wanted a new type rating though due to pilot training concerns.

[asquared17]

alas i am scheduled on a 737max next saturday and there are no bigger/other planes to fly the entire day. 

sometimes it just is what it is. 

[WAYNO]

22 hours ago, Obdave said:

Wayno, I booked a refundable delta flight boi-Atl-tpa  three weeks ago as a backup.  The flight gets into Tampa at midnight but at least we’ll get there. Alaska has refunded our flight but without a backup we’d be paying through the nose for a flight with three or four legs. I’d suggest you look into doing the same. I was tipped off that our flight wouldn’t get an equipment swap when they quit selling tickets earlier this week when there were still empty seats

Well, looks like the stars are aligned for us. 

Our upcoming flights have been continually changing. Sometimes just a flight number change, sometimes just a time change, and sometimes a whole 'nother flight.

I checked the history of my flights.  Right now, the scheduled aircraft are all the unaffected (so far)  737-8's.  And no flights have been cancelled. 

I have also checked for substitute flights with other airlines.  I will continue to monitor this before I attempt a preemptive correction.  If I do have to make a change, the prices have escalated considerably since I booked the original flight. 

[RCIfan1912]

24 minutes ago, asquared17 said:

alas i am scheduled on a 737max next saturday and there are no bigger/other planes to fly the entire day. 

sometimes it just is what it is. 

You'll be just fine but it's still very disappointing that issues with this plane. It makes me very sad what is going on with Boeing. We just be proud of Boeing but right now it's tough. 

[Geezer Of The Seas]

6 hours ago, twangster said:

Boeing desperately wanted the MAX to share the type rating with some previous 737 types so that pilots wouldn't need to be specifically trained and type rated for the MAX.   The idea was that pilots who flew other 737 could walk into the cockpit of a MAX and fly it with minimal if any training required.    This would help sell the MAX to airlines that already had 737s in their fleets.

In hindsight it's clear that should not have been allowed.  Boeing should have been required to create a new type rating for the MAX.  That would have led to more pilot training including on MCAS.  

Watched the documentary about the Max on Netflix last year. The program may have been produced to evoke a reaction, but one thing an interview with an engineer pointed out that is indisputable, the basic airframe from which every iteration of the 737 that's been built since the 737-100 was introduced is now 60 years old. The point being  you can only smear so much lipstick on a pig before it's time for blank slate or a new pig.

[smokeybandit]

Nothing really wrong with the basic airframe though. And lots has changed over the years. The wing has changed. The engines have changed a ton (and is why there was MCAS to begin with). Other aerodynamics have changed.

A clean sheet design is a very long and expensive process. And we're at the point where there just isn't much to gain by building a brand new plane, especially narrow bodies. That's why neither Airbus nor Boeing have launched a new narrow body model in over 40 years.

[twangster]

7 hours ago, smokeybandit said:

No airline would have wanted a new type rating though due to pilot training concerns.

That's a trend for all commercial aviation.  

There was a time that a significant number of airline pilots came from the Air Force.   Very disciplined, highly trained, highly capable, many hours of flight time.

Today there are significant numbers of younger pilots who have no military background and a fraction of the flight hours or training.  And that's on Delta.  

The airlines have been calling on the FAA to allow even lesser trained with fewer hours to qualify.

So much for training right?  Who needs training to fly a plane right?  Just ask the families of the MAX victims.  

[WAYNO]

The 737 is a great airplane.  Yes, there have been some snafu's, which   have happened elsewhere too.  That's not meant to be a defense. Balls have been dropped. 

Other than the shape, there's little common between the original FLUF's and the extreme range, re-engined stretched versions of the 21st century. 

What is different, is modern digital technology.  Depend on robots and computers completely, there is a loss of some checks and balances. 

Am I bias'd?  You betcha.  If it ain't Boeing, I ain't going.

 

Yours truly in a very early 737, 53 years ago.

 

[Geezer Of The Seas]

33 minutes ago, twangster said:

 

Today there are significant numbers of younger pilots who have no military background and a fraction of the flight hours or training.  And that's on Delta.  

 

Got a nephew who just got his gold wings with the aforementioned airline after  almost 17 years. Graduated from Univ. of North Dakota, went to work out of school with one of the late Northwest's commuter lines puddle jumping all over the Midwest. Delta acquired NWA, he made it to the big leagues in the right seat, survived the pandemic layoffs. Right seat time in the intervening years until last September when he got the left seat. "Drives" 757's, 767's, A320-321 and when he's not doing his day job he's flying C-130's in his Air National Guard unit. I'm glad he persevered.