Landing for emergency means inspections galore
A five by one foot gap was ripped in a Southwest Airlines airplane on Flight 812 near the cockpit on Friday, April 1, reports USA Today. This was a flight going from Phoenix to Sacramento. The flight was able to make an emergency landing at a military base near Yuma, Ariz., and fortunately no passengers or crews were harmed. Normal wear and tear on the aircraft caused the aluminum “skin” of the airplane to tear. Stress fractures occurred first. The National Transportation Safety Board explained that in March 2010 the airplane had been inspected. Southwest said this kind of thing is very rare, states Reuters.
Flights stopped for a while
The couple of days after the incident, Southwest grounded 600 aircrafts. Monday, April 4, another 100 airplanes were anticipated to be stalled. Model aircrafts like this were inspected by the airline. This was to see if there were comparable cracks in any of them. There are 171 Boeing 737-300 planes that Southwest owns like the one in the incident. There are Boeing 737 variants being inspected by Southwest. Of all time, the 737 has sold the best. It is very popular, Bloomberg explains. Southwest aircrafts are generally of short durations, which means each aircraft has to undergo that several more takeoffs and landings, which are probably the most stressful events on an aircraft during a flight. Unless an inspector is specifically looking for the quarter of an inch cracks in the Flight 812 aircraft incident, they will be hard to discover.
Travel costs affected by costs of maintaining planes
Most airplanes are inspected regularly for safety reasons. Once a year, they're taken out of use for an in-depth inspection as well. There is a concern the Federal Aviation Administration has though. They want an expiration date to be enforced. Take-offs and landings can be very hard on an aircraft. Nevertheless, it is easier than paying $30 million to replace it. Air travel will go up quite a bit if legislation needs regular purchase of new airplanes.
Articles cited
USA Today
usatoday.com/money/industries/travel/2011-04-03-Southwest-jet_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip
Reuters
reuters.com/article/2011/04/04/airlines-southwest-idUSN0320240220110404
Bloomberg
bloomberg.com/news/2011-04-03/southwest-737-jet-showed-previous-cracking-near-tear-ntsb-says.html
Source of article - Southwest Airlines grounding flights after hole rips in plane by Newsytype.com.
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