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United Airlines found loose screws on Boeing 737 Max 9 planes after the Alaska Airlines incident.

File photo. A worker walks past Boeing’s new 737 MAX-9 under construction at its production facility in Renton, Washington, USA. February 13, 2017. REUTERS/Jason Redmond

United Airlines said Monday it had found loose screws on its Boeing 737 Max 9 planes.After this last Saturday, the authorities operated a device of a stable model Alaska AirlinesPart of the fuselage was lost in mid-flight.

“Since we began our initial investigation on Saturday, we have found the door panels to be related to installation issues: for example, screws that need additional tightening,” United Airlines said in a brief statement to the media today.

“These findings will be rectified by our technical operations team to safely return the aircraft to service,” he added.

United Airlines is the largest operator Boeing 737 Max 9It has 79 of these planes in its fleet, while Alaska Airlines, which has not yet commented on any inspections, has 65.

An Alaska Airlines plane that fell victim to the incident on Saturday Lost at an altitude of about 5,000 meters The panel with which the gap was sealed was designed to house an additional emergency door, a common measure on airplanes operating low passenger density routes.

Passengers’ oxygen masks hang from the ceiling next to a missing window and part of a side wall of Alaska Airlines Flight 1282, which was en route to Ontario, California, and crashed shortly after takeoff in Portland, Oregon, USA, January 5, 2018. Instagram/@strawberrvy via REUTERS ES

The plane was forced to return to the city of Portland (Oregon), where it took off a few minutes after takeoff without sustaining any serious injuries.

The Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) ordered the immediate grounding of all 737 Max 9s. With a similar configuration of Alaska Airlines aircraft to be inspected, and this Monday Boeing sent them instructions to carry out.

The measure, also adopted by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), does not affect any of the company’s aircraft in Europe, as the configuration of the Boeing 737 Max 9 operating in Community space is different.

In total, 215 of these aircraft are in service worldwide, and in addition to United and Alaska Airlines, Panamanian Copa Airlines, Mexican Aeromexico, Icelandair, Turkish Airlines and Flydubai are among their fleets.

National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators examined the fuselage plug area of ​​Alaska Airlines Boeing 737-9 MAX Flight 1282, which was recovered at the property in Portland, Oregon, which jettisoned and forced the aircraft to make an emergency landing. , US

Just two weeks ago, the Boeing 737 was in the news again, after an American multinational asked for it Airlines inspect their planes for possible loose screws in control systems.

The latest incident has once again put the Boeing 737 Max plane in the spotlight, which was grounded in much of the world for nearly two years after two accidents involving the 737 Max 8 model in Indonesia and Ethiopia in 2019 that killed 346 people. And 2020.

In those two cases, it was determined that the flight control software had generated erroneous information and placed the aircraft in a descending position, despite the pilots’ efforts to reverse the instruction.

Alaska Airlines Boeing planes were not being used for flights to Hawaii after warning lights on three separate flights that may have indicated pressurization problems, a federal official said Sunday.

Alaska Airlines decided not to use the aircraft on long flights over water If the warning lights come back on, the plane “may return to the airport very quickly”.Jennifer Homendi, president of the United States’ National Transportation Safety Board, said at a press conference Sunday night.

Homandy cautioned that the pressurized light may not be related to Friday’s incident.

Homendi also gave new details about the scene of chaos on the plane and in the cabin when a panel flew off and left a hole in the side of the plane. No one was injured and the plane landed safely back in Portland with 171 passengers and six crew on board.

The cockpit door burst and the turbulence tore off the co-pilot’s headphones, while the captain lost part of his headphones. A quick reference guide kept close to the flight crew also kept flying, Homandi said.

“It was described as chaotic and very loud, between the air and everything that was going on around it, and it was very violent,” he said.

(with information from EFE and AP)

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