Boeing has told 16 airlines to ground some Boeing 737 MAXes until they confirm a proper ground connection on part of the electrical system after discovering a potential manufacturing fault. Dozens of aircraft all over the world are affected. Southwest pulled 30 from service, American 17 and United 16. None of the airlines has reported any issues because of the potential fault, which is isolated to one part of the electrical system. It is not related to the flight control system.
The airlines have been told to inspect the planes and check the ground and fix it if necessary. The inspection only takes a few hours but if it needs to be fixed the plane could be out of service for a few days. There have been several maintenance bulletins on the type since its return to service after a two-year grounding earlier this year but the first that took the planes out of service.
Alerts do occur, but this one does not help confidence in the Modified Max.
Good for AvWeb to highlight the afflicted system is not flight controls.
Some? Why not ground them all, until everything is fixed–properly? What are they waiting for,
another accident–or a fatal crash? Those 63 planes represent 1/6 (16.8%) of the fleet that was
in storage last year, until the FAA (recklessly, and prematurely) let Boeing resume its operations,
along with their corporate customers. The electrical malfunction may seem slight, but that is no
reason to be nonchalant. If it only takes “a few hours” to inspect, then do so–now. But what if
the result of the inspection entails (extensive) repairs? Or is that a mere afterthought–after the
worst has happened? No flaw or defect is too minor to disregard or ignore. That is, unless the
manufacturer and the airlines don’t care about human lives–or anything, except making a buck.
They don’t ground all of them because not all are affected. Just a range of planes built between certain dates.