Based on its inspection of the first 40 of more than 170 jets, the Federal Aviation Administration appears ready to allow the Boeing 737 Max 9 back in the air.
But airlines have to agree to perform additional inspections.
The troubled model has been grounded since a January 5 incident in which an Alaska Airlines jet had a side panel blown off in midflight.
The FAA has issued a new Airworthiness Directive (AD) that will allow most MAX 9s to return to service.
But the Airworthiness Directive comes with a mandatory maintenance order. It’s up to the airline to perform that maintenance within a specified time frame.
The FAA originally issued an Airworthiness Directive that grounded the MAX 9 in the first place. But it did not yet issue specific maintenance orders to complete, leaving the plane grounded. At issue are the bolts and screws that hold the panel in place that were either missing or loose on that particular Alaska Airlines flight.
The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating.
Both Alaska and United Airlines are the only two domestic carriers that utilize that particular model of aircraft.
“We’re going to get better, not because the two of us are talking, but because (of) the engineers at Boeing, the mechanics at Boeing, the inspectors at Boeing, the engineers at Spirit [Aerospace], the mechanics at Spirit, the inspectors at Spirit,” said David Calhoun, the CEO of Boeing.
Spirit Aerospace is not affiliated with Spirit Airlines. It manufactures the fuselage for the 737 family.
The FAA only recently completed the first round of its inspections of the beleaguered jet.
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