At least three of the four bolts that should have closed it were missing. The door of the Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 Max that crashed on January 5th on the plane that left Portland and headed for Ontario, California, was not properly secured .
This is supported by the report of the National Transportation Safety Board of the United States in its investigation into the near-air tragedy.
The door literally exploded 20 minutes after take-off : pure terror on board, the images that ended up on social media were terrifying. The panel coming off, the hole in the fuselage, the freezing wind coming in, the oxygen masks coming down and some clothing flying out .
Fortunately, the tragedy was only a near miss, the pilot was forced to make an emergency landing and all 177 people on board the aircraft were saved .
After the accident, the American airline stopped its 65 Boeing 737 Max 9s as a precaution, a model that had already been at the center of controversy due to safety issues. And that poorly done fixing, without bolts, which caused the tailgate to explode, is destined to generate further controversy.
The lack of bolts, we read in the investigation, meant that the door covering an unused emergency exit moved and then detached, creating a hole in the fuselage and consequently a sudden depressurization . The piece was produced by the company Spirit AeroSystems, a Boeing supplier and already under fire for other accidents . According to the reconstruction, the door had been removed at the factory due to a series of damages during production, when it was reinstalled in the fuselage for delivery to the American company, at least three of the four bolts were missing , as a series of photographs would demonstrate.
(Unioneonline/L)