BOEING’S LATEST TAILSPIN
Leak caps week of issues
Not again …
A United Airlines Boeing 777-300 aircraft suffered a midair fuel leak and was forced to make an emergency landing Monday, marking the fifth incident the airline reported in a little over a week.
United Airlines Flight 830 took off for a 14-hour journey from Sydney to San Francisco, but only two hours into the flight, the plane had to be redirected over a “maintenance issue,” ABC 7 reported.
All 183 passengers and crew onboard “landed safely, and passengers deplaned normally at the gate,” a statement from the airline read. No injuries were reported. Monday’s incident is the latest in a string of mishaps suffered onboard a Boeing aircraft.
On March 4, a Boeing 737 was forced to make an emergency landing in Texas just minutes into its flight after flames exploded from one of its jet engines.
A shocking video from the ordeal showed flames spewing from the engine, appearing to get so hot that they appeared almost white against the night sky.
The plane was only “approximately 15 minutes” into the twohour trip to Fort Myers, Fla., when the incident occurred. No one was injured in the terrifying ordeal.
On March 7, a United Airlines flight from San Francisco to Japan was forced to divert to Los Angeles International Airport after one of the landing gear on the Boeing 777-20 fell off after takeoff.
All 235 passengers, 10 flight attendants, and four pilots on board safely landed at LAX.
The following day, United Flight 821 took off from San Francisco International Airport headed to Mexico City but was quickly diverted to Los Angeles “due to an issue with the aircraft’s hydraulic system.”
The Airbus 320’s hydraulic system suffered an issue in one of its three hydraulic units. The aircraft has multiple systems for redundancy.
The 105 passengers and five crew were evacuated, and customers had to travel to their destination on a new aircraft.
That same day, a United Airlines flight went off a runway at Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport, forcing passengers to evacuate.
The Boeing 737 MAX 8, arriving from Memphis, “rolled onto the grass when exiting onto the taxiway around 8 a.m.,” the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement.
No injuries were reported among the 160 passengers and six crew members.
In a memo to employees on Tuesday, Boeing said it is adding weekly compliance checks for every 737 work area and additional equipment audits to reduce quality problems.