Comments on: Southwest Airlines Engine Washing

By: Juliansworld

Juliansworld — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

Jet engines …
Jet engines fascinate me to no end. I would love to really observe them up close and find out all the details of how they work.

By: hawktb9

hawktb9 — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

Yep. Look at how a …
Yep. Look at how a lot of airlines folded because of lucrative maintenance practices. For example, ValuJet was almost forced to close its doors because of the crash in the Everglades, but since they bought out AirTran, they’re still ValuJet under the AirTran name. Their maintenance is not done in-house. It’s all outsourced, to keep their costs down, AND to shift the blame elsewhere whenever something goes wrong.

By: cosmicviewer477

cosmicviewer477 — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

hawktb9, you’re …
hawktb9, you’re right. What do you think are the implications for the future of airline safety? Should we expect an increase in incidents? Like my political science professor used to say, “Nothing ever just happens…There’s always a series of events that leads up to the main event…” The same is true of airline incidents, and the beginning could very well be lax maintenance log-keeping.

By: hawktb9

hawktb9 — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

A lot of it has to …
A lot of it has to do with politics, my friend. The goings-on behind the scenes is what got a lot of airlines in trouble, and unfortunately, it’s all part of the business world. The FAA’s only doing its job of overseeing the practices of all airlines and their staff. The fines come when the inspectors find some glaring discrepancies in the paperwork, which is proof enough of under-the-table dealings. *shrug* That’s life, I guess.

By: pr53188

pr53188 — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

That is a very …
That is a very interesting video!!

By: mrtbuddy

mrtbuddy — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

Actually, you could …
Actually, you could say the same about American Airlines and Delta. It looks normal. The FAA looks into actions by airlines, and Southwest is one.

By: kcjuggalo2001

kcjuggalo2001 — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

very cool, what …
very cool, what stations do they do that at?

By: cosmicviewer477

cosmicviewer477 — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

My apologies, I …
My apologies, I meant the FAA. If you log on to the FAA website and do a simple search, say, “Southwest Airlines”, a whole host of maintenance-related filings in the quarterly-enforcement reports come up. It’s pretty interesting. Just on Page 7, I counted six maintenance-related enforcement issues. I’m not sure about this, but is it normal for FAA to file so many claims against one airline in just one quarter?

By: hawktb9

hawktb9 — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

The NTSB does not …
The NTSB does not fine airlines for lax maintenance. They’re only an advisory panel which cam only recommend procedures to both airlines and manufacturers regarding faults that led up to an accident after the investigation. In other words, NTSB is like the FBI; an investigative bureau. As for what recently happened, it was a freak incident that happened to the SWA plane. The cause is not from poor maintenance, though. SWA’s got a great maintenance program, and that alone says a lot for SWA.

By: cosmicviewer477

cosmicviewer477 — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:17:12 +0000

Well, Hawktb9: …
Well, Hawktb9: apparently, SW is being fined up to $10.2 million by the NTSB for lax maintenance. This came up due to an incident where during a flight from Nashville to Baltimore at 34,000 feet, a foot-long rip in the fuselage caused rapid decompression that forced pilots to return the craft to the airport without injuries, thankfully. I am not an alarmist, and I’m sure that Southwest isn’t the only one, but airlines are in trouble. Maintenance issues are become more and more apparent.