US grounds Boeing 737 Max 9 jets after mid-air emergency | BBC News

The US airline regulator has ordered the grounding of some Boeing 737 Max 9 jets after a section of the fuselage fell off in mid-air during an Alaska Airlines flight. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said the inspections would affect 171 planes.

The Alaska Airlines flight from Portland, Oregon to Ontario, California, was carrying 177 passengers and crew. It had reached 16,000ft when the section of the hull fell away causing the depressurisation of the cabin. The aircraft made an emergency descent and landed safely back in Portland.

Images taken by people on the flight showed a large hole in the fuselage next to passenger seats. There were no reports of any injuries.

Jane Hill presents BBC News at Ten reporting by Graham Satchell.

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[Werrf]

Nobody advertises Airbus better than Boeing.

[lenniegodber]

Props to the pilots
The real question here is wtf is going on with Boeing. Hard to believe this is the same company that gave the world the 747.

[DCTag]

The 737 Max. The gift that keeps on giving.

[navbtactual]

That's scary af, that kid is never flying again. Poor guy, props to his Mom.

[charlesbarkely]

Jeez imagine your kid getting sucked out of an airplane. Glad that parent was able to hold on to him

[spacecadet]

Remember, this is the company that shifted its Headquarters from Seattle to Chicago so that the management team would not have to talk to the engineers.

[LunaticTheCat]

Boeing is insanely lucky that no one died from this incident.

[richardkotorac]

Just when you think the reputation of the aircraft couldn’t get worse

[AftermarketInd]

Imagine that door made impact with the tail when it blew off... lets talk about that. Completely inexcusable. People need to be criminally charged.

[zogzog]

In 2019 I vowed I would never get on a MAX.

[chadflpo]

Let's just cancel the Max please and thanks.

[kralikkral]

To me it was always clear that I will not put one leg into 737max.
Why? Just look into the history of this design and production and read comments of former Boeing employees.

[RFC]

Suddenly those thick EU rulebooks and overly long testing procedures that Airbus goes through don't sound so bad, eh?

[billyshaw]

Plane crashes & faults are relatively rare, but when it comes to Boeing it's more of a to do list.

[gellytin]

Man, TWO aviation incidents, both not even a WEEK into the new year. 2024 is seriously a rough year for the aviation community. Huge props to the pilots for safely landing the plane!

[ADAMSIXTIES]

It's just lucky it happened on takeoff at 16000' as opposed to over the ocean at 40000'. You can actually get by without extra oxygen at that altitude, but the pilots quickly descended to a comfortable 10000' . They were back in PDX within 20 minutes. Now they can ground the Max (again) until they figure out the issue. I won't ever be taking a Max.

[kakaogamegyu]

If this accident occurred on a Southeast Asian airline, Boeing would definitely blame the airline for not carrying out proper maintenance and the US government will not rush to ground it

[Steven-voee]

The Boeing 737 Max series makes the de Havilland Comet and the McDonnell Douglas DC10 look like the pinnacles of aviation safety by comparison.

[yogibarista]

It wasn't a "window and section of a fuselage" - it was a door plug to disable the mid emergency exit, which is allowed for lower passenger config. Obviously the investigation will focus on the fitment of that plug.

[andrewwilliams]

Here we go again. I have to travel in less than 2 weeks and it's on a 737 - Max 8, but a few days ago I read about loose bolts on these aircrafts and now this on a Max 9. I think this may spell the end of the road for Boeing. Thank goodness no one was injured or died. Great job to the pilots for taking control.