FAA tells airlines to check panels on a second Boeing plane

The FAA recommended late Sunday night that airlines begin visual inspections of door plugs installed on Boeing 737-900ER planes, the second Boeing model to come under scrutiny this month. The FAA said the plane had the same door plug design as the company’s newer 737 Max 9. The agency grounded about 170 Max 9 jets after a door panel blew off one of the planes shortly after an Alaska Airlines flight left Portland, Ore., on Jan. 5, forcing an emergency landing. The door plugs are placed as a panel where an emergency door would otherwise be if a plane was configured with more seats. After grounding the Max 9 planes, the FAA subsequently announced it was investigating whether Boeing failed to ensure that the jet was safe and conformed to the design approved by the agency. The FAA said on Sunday that the door plug on the 737-900ER, an earlier-generation model that is not part of Boeing’s Max line, had not yet been a problem. “As an added layer of safety, the Federal Aviation Administration is recommending that operators of Boeing 737-900ER aircraft visually inspect mid-exit door plugs to ensure the door is properly secured,” the agency said in a statement. The FAA is recommending that the airlines using the 737-900ER immediately inspect the four locations used to secure the door plug to the airframe. The 737-900ER has over 11m hours of operation and about 4m flight cycles, according to the FAA. Boeing delivered about 500 of the planes globally between 2007 and 2019, though not all of them have door plugs. “We fully support the FAA and our customers in this action,” Boeing said in a statement.<br/>