It has been announced on Oct 19, 2009 the FAA may be expanding its investigation into suspected structural problems found in a small portion of American Airlines jets, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The newspaper reported Saturday that at least one of the Fort Worth-based airline’s McDonnell Douglas MD-80 series jets was believed to be in such poor shape that it was ferried without passengers to a maintenance base at low altitudes to avoid stressing the fuselage by pressurizing it.
Be it known that American is phasing out all of the MD80’s for new Boeing 737’s, a much improved aircraft.
The Journal also reported Saturday that preliminary FAA findings showed as many as 16 jets that were operated for months despite substandard repairs.
Last month, an FAA official said regulators were investigating repairs to the rear bulkhead of aircraft in the aging fleet.
I remember years ago as that great company was being purposefully destroyed by the greed of pirate raider Frank Lorenzo, a picture of an Eastern Airlines DC-9 sitting on a runway very nicely except the entire tail had broken off at the rear bulkhead during landing and there it sat with those engines pointing at a 45 degree angle to the sky.
This condition is NOT the fault of American Airlines it is another result of the failed policy we call airline deregulation. This kind of thing never happened when the industry was regulated because the airlines had enough money to replace the fleet within the proper safety margins.
The answer to the deteriorating conditions of the airline industry is to move away from the current medieval model of greed for a few while the industry and its employees slowly starve to death. We need to employ a new attitude, a new vision of building up instead of this race to the bottom. A new vision that sees growth through cooperation with the companies and government, a rebirth of caring for the working people of the nation turning on the faucets of money within the paychecks of our people allowing those people to spread that money into their communities’ businesses, a new vision that attacks the greed of the international banks and multinational corporations with great vigor or even a better; a vengeance.
As for the airlines restore a CAB (citizens aviation board) type entity, reregulate the airlines and if need be eliminate the newer cattle car airlines so as to provide more seats for the real trunk carriers.
This is a national security issue. The nation needs an airline industry run by mature adults that has been enabled to deal with the realities of this world, passenger’s needs, baggage, freight, mail, and yes aircraft maintenance. Air travel was never meant to be a cheap thing for broke people to wear out going from one vacation fun spot to another, it’s expensive now and for our generation always will be, it’s time to grow up and face these facts. We can no longer allow the pirating of passengers to the nonsense cheap cattle car non-airlines that have only a limited self interest for board room profiteers with no commitment to a long term quality comprehensive product.
