Comments on: When a Wing Comes Apart

By: Rob Mathews

Rob Mathews — Thu, 21 Mar 2024 18:23:07 +0000

Patrick,

When one door closes, another opens. – Boeing

By: Mike

Mike — Sat, 09 Mar 2024 19:26:40 +0000

Patrick,
Great blog. I thought of this post, which I read a few days ago, again today. I agree about the mass hysteria media-wise. But UA had a not-so-great week – losing a tire at SFO on takeoff, an engine fire 15-minutes after takeoff, and landing gear failure in HOU. Yikes.

By: Kevin Brady

Kevin Brady — Fri, 08 Mar 2024 14:47:23 +0000

Patrick,

Thanks for the answer on no flap landing, I found it quite interesting. Also, I now know there are two different spellings of “Columbia” and “ Colombia”

By: George

George — Thu, 07 Mar 2024 18:28:04 +0000

More concerning is a report out today of an incident in which the rudder pedals were stuck on a United 737 Max 8 upon landing at Newark. A test flight of the aircraft three days afterwards duplicated the issue. This, especially if not limited to this particular aircraft, is a very serious safety issue to say the least.

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/us-ntsb-probes-stuck-rudder-pedal-issue-boeing-737-max-flight-2024-03-07/

By: James Walley

James Walley — Thu, 07 Mar 2024 09:15:06 +0000

I just read that, on March 4th, there was an engine failure on a United 757-300 enroute from HNL to SFO. The incident occurred late in the flight, within a couple hundred miles of the destination airport, and the aircraft completed the flight normally – but, of course, it was a Boeing, so… Adding insult to injury on the Microsoft News website was a glaring error in the story that the 757 “had only been in service for two weeks.”

By: Mitch

Mitch — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 22:49:09 +0000

Ted Kenney
You were very lucky to have survived,
A leading edge slat segment that is damaged or missing can be very dangerous. Under those circumstances, the L and R wings have different maximum lift hence different stall speeds. If the airplane slows into that speed gap, one wing will stall. The asymmetric lift will cause the airplane to roll suddenly, perhaps out of control. The only remedy is to accelerate so that lift once again becomes symmetric. (There will be a slight lateral mistrim due to asymmetric wing drag)
Chris H
Leading edge flaps give more lift at the same speed (raise the lift curve); trailing edge flaps reduce stall speed by increasing lift beyond the flaps up maximum (extend the lift curve).
They MUST be used together,
Leading and trailing edge high-lift devices are controlled from a single lever. On some aircraft, the first detent will extend partial leading edge flaps; the second detent will extend the full leading edges. On other aircraft, all leading edge devices extend with the first detent.
Trailing edge flap extension increases with further detents without any additional leading edge motion.

By: K.P. Scarr

K.P. Scarr — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 22:12:52 +0000

As ever the voice of reason. Thanks for this. For future reference, you can include links to articles and videos on other sites. Doing so does not infringe on any IP, copyrights included.

By: Len Drasin

Len Drasin — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 15:57:34 +0000

What’s your take on the Boeing fiasco. Beside the Max crashes, and the door plugs, we see other stories, such as cracked windshield, construction debris left on board,and so on.

Before the merger with McDonald-Douglas, Boeing was a fabulous company, with an equally fabulous history. Since the merger, it’s profit and speed above all.

It’s almost like the planes are being made by Lego, or Fisher-Price.

By: John Pappas

John Pappas — Sat, 02 Mar 2024 18:29:29 +0000

Ah, yes, of course. I did make a mistake regarding the airline involved. And did that make any difference to the crew and passengers, of just those several situations? They died simply because of a (or several) maintenance personnel and probably corporate executives and the FAA not being honest. Please, let’s stay on point and look at what really is the cause of so many aviation disasters. Shortsightedness, complacency, not following established procedures in our piloting and maintenance activities needs to be addressed – not squawking about a mistake of an airline name. Have you researched the cause of any of those disasters? Hmmmm . . .

By: steve

steve — Sat, 02 Mar 2024 18:25:27 +0000

Exactly my thoughts on Boeing! United has been the maintenance for this plane the last 42 years!!