Trying to avoid certain types of aircraft really doesn’t work very well. When I fly to Dallas to see my sister, I fly on American, and they operate A-320 and A-321 aircraft on that route so I’m stuck flying in what amounts to an empty coffee can. Very noisy. On a trip to Atlanta this past weekend we flew on Jetblue A-321 aircraft. Again very noisy. That said, when we research airline tickets for a trip we do look at the aircraft type for the trip. The nice thing about Jetblue is that the first three rows of seats are very roomy. So if you fly Jetblue, be sure to reserve one of those seats. If the trip is on a Boeing, we are just more comfortable on the flight.
I see. The ones I really hated were the stretch DC-8 and the 757. Single aisle aircraft with minimal facilities.
My father, who was in that business for 48 years, called the 757 the “ultimate CEO” transport. A money maker.
There are less failures today because of poor maintenance than 10-50 years ago. Some of that is better design but it’s also because of better training. For you catagorize mechanics as “just wanting a paycheck” is pretty naive. It’s not like these are Mcdonald’s employees, the ones working on these planes take their job seriously. Nothing personal Armor 2.0, I just take offense to what you said especially since I work in a field that has people as it’s cargo and I know how serious that is taken in my workplace. It’s not just a paycheck… lives depend on what we put out.
some of them should be McDonald employee probably be qualified .
armor 2.0 I take serious offense to this comment. I am a certified A&P mechanic and have been in the industry for over 25 years. I can assure you that we take our jobs very seriously.
I agree.
Now enough with the bickering.
Bickering BS on that.
Stickpushers dad and my dad did whole careers in the airline industry.
At least 90 years between the two of them.
I am married to a woman who’s father was a tech in the Arrmy Airforce.
You can’t touch a high bypass turbofan without a cert.
Bickering? No way.
EDIT: I’m not done.
Airline employees hold everyone’s lives in their hands.
And their daily interchange is with a broad slice of humanity.
But they operate complex systems with nothing but complaints in return.
Ill bet Captain Tammy Jo would step in front of anyone who dared to show up to take a punch in person at the mechanics at SWA.
Still not done.
Put an Artho scope up the engine of the critic.
Aircraft mechanics know that lives are at stake… if a car breaks down due to a mechanical failure, it’s not common that an injury occurs, unless the driver is doing something unsafe to begin with. If an aircraft breaks down in flight… at minimum it is a thrill ride for folks who asked for no such thing… at worst, as the Black Hats at Benning said, “the sky, like the sea, is unforgiving”…
And even folks who work at McDonalds know that they have standards to meet as well, or people get sick. Unwashed hands, undercooked food… but yeah, they’re only food service workers, they’re not doing anything of importance.
Certified A&P IA here just looking for a paycheck…
Yeah because airplane mechanic take there job so seriously just this year had two military aircraft fall out of the sky for no reason .kill innocent military personal wonder what serious mechanic done preventive maintenance on them. I’ certified to do annual inspection on single engine planes I have seen mechanics that are totally dedicated to what they do lve also seen people just didn’ care and I’ve also seen the work of the less dedictted people not pretty.
The engine failure on the SW flight was due to metal fatigue - one of those situations where the problem doesn’t really show until things start going south. Consequently, the process dictates that the FAA starts its investigation by interviewing the quality assurance inspector who signed off on the engine, rather than jumping straight on the backs of the AP mechanics.
I spend far too much of every single week dealing with quality assurance inspectors who just don’t get it. They are the last in line to protect the end users and consumers in a very long process of constant inspections, but a handful just can’t seem to grasp that concept.
Just a handful of them are utterly worthless. They claim expertise, but almost never do a thing to prove it. While my technicians (a lot of former AP mechanics) are on the production floor doing their damnedest to be perfect at every turn, these “quality” individuals are usually found in the break room, stuffing their faces and talking trash because the mechanics have corrected them or they have to ask questions about even the simplest procedures because they’ve never so much as tried to do it themselves. They spend their inspection time complaining to others - “I hate it here and I want to move”, “I can’t get anything done, so what’s wrong with me?” and so on. Poor attitudes result in poor performance.
And you want to talk about who should be flipping burgers for a clown? These jerks give me written reports that are so full of grammatical errors and misspelling that I am left wondering just how they managed to pass their qualification exams or just how many cereal boxes they had to collect to send off for credentials in the first place. Truly embarrassing garbage that you would never even consider passing along to a customer like Boeing or General Dynamics because they would laugh you straight out of a contract.
Be nice to those AP mechanics. Both the FAA and the military know where to start their investigation - by looking for the signature of the guy who signed his name in the inspection block of the sign-off giving the OK to take the bird up in the first place.
Well… until the investigation is complete, nobody knows. It can be equipment failure, pilot error, or mother Nauture showing us humans we are not all powerful. Military flying is usually more dangerous than civil aviation. There is a reason the two aircraft that you mention crashed. And it will be found. Sometimes the case is obvious, sometimes it is not.
Yes, ask Sullenberger.
BTW this post was originally about the capability of the pilot, not the cause of the engine failure.