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The Boeing 737 MAX 8 that skidded off the runway after landing in Houston on Friday is the latest in a series of at least nine major incidents involving the company’s planes.
The plane, which arrived from Memphis, is said to have suffered some type of train collapse while leaving the runway at George Bush Airport. The 160 passengers and six crew members were not injured.
Footage showed the plane stopped with its wing touching the ground at the side of the runway, as passengers were rushed out via an emergency staircase at the door.
The incident is yet another to affect the beleaguered airlines’ planes, including two fatal crashes that killed a total of 346 people.
Here, DailyMail.com looks at some of the high-profile incidents and production problems that have hit Boeing in recent years.
A Boeing 737 Max operated by United Airlines skidded off the runway onto the grass as it exited the runway at George Bush Airport in Houston early Friday.
Shocking images showed the plane lying on its wings off a runway after suffering an apparent train collapse.
THE WHEEL FALLS OFF AFTER TAKEOFF
A wheel fell off a Boeing 777-200 shortly after takeoff in San Francisco on Thursday.
The 256-pound wheel fell from a United Airlines plane shortly after takeoff in San Francisco and crushed the cars parked below after falling to the ground.
United Airlines Flight 35 It left San Francisco airport en route to Osaka in Japan and had barely left the runway when the wheel of the Boeing 777-200 came off.
The plane with 235 passengers and 14 crew diverted to Los Angeles Airport after it was alerted to a landing gear failure at 11:35 a.m. Thursday.
The plane landed safely at LAX around 1:20 p.m. without further incident and no injuries were reported on the ground.
‘The 777-200 has six tires on each of the two main landing gear struts. “The aircraft is designed to land safely with missing or damaged tires,” United said.
A 256-pound wheel fell off a passenger plane as it took off, crushing the cars where it landed after hitting the ground.
ENGINE FIRE IN FLIGHT COURSE
On Monday, just days before the wheel incident, a 737 engine caught fire in mid-flight.
A heart-stopping video captured the moment the engines of a Boeing plane exploded and burst into flames in the skies over Texas, forcing an emergency landing.
The terrifying incident took place just minutes into a United Airlines flight bound for Fort Myers, Florida.
Video taken from the passenger window shows white-hot flashes coming from the 737’s jet engine.
Moments later, they were forced to make an emergency landing and return to Houston’s George H. Bush Intercontinental Airport moments after takeoff. No injuries were reported in the incident.
Gate explosion at 16,000 feet
A Boeing plane also suffered a near-catastrophe in January when the door of a 737 MAX 9 plane exploded at 16,000 feet over Portland, Oregon, forcing an emergency landing.
In January, an Alaska Airlines flight came close to disaster when a plane door exploded 16,000 feet above Portland.
There were no serious injuries from the terrible air failure, but passengers’ belongings, including phones, flew from the plane.
Earlier this week, the head of the National Transportation Safety Board accused Boeing of failing to provide some key records requested in its ongoing investigation into the mid-air cabin door emergency.
NTSB Chairwoman Jennifer Homendy said investigators have sought the names of the 25 people who work on door stoppers at a Boeing facility in Renton, Washington, but have not received them from Boeing.
“It’s absurd that two months later we don’t have it,” Homendy said at a Senate Commerce Committee hearing on Wednesday.
Boeing insisted that it had initially provided the NTSB with some of the names of Boeing employees, including door specialists that it believed would have relevant information.
Sen. Ted Cruz, the top Republican on the Commerce Committee, called it “absolutely unacceptable” that the NTSB was not receiving full cooperation from Boeing.
Homendy also confirmed that the MAX 9’s door stopper had moved during previous flights, citing marks on the door.
FATAL INCIDENTS INVOLVING THE 737 MAX
The most serious problems have affected the 737 Max, the latest version of its 737, a workhorse of passenger aviation.
After the door burst, United Airlines said inspections of other 737 Max planes prompted by the incident on the Alaska Airlines flight revealed loose bolts and other “installation issues” in the part that failed: a door plug used to seal openings used for additional access. emergency exits in some aircraft configurations.
Safety and manufacturing issues have also plagued other models.
In 2018, a woman was killed when a piece of engine casing ripped off a Southwest Airlines 737 and shattered the window she was sitting next to.
She was partially sucked out of the plane when she lost cabin pressure before being lifted back on by other passengers.
The wreckage of the Ethiop Airlines Boeing 737-MAX plane is seen on March 11, 2019.
Lion Air Boeing 737 Max engine inspected after crashing in Indonesia in 2018
boeing It began work on the Max in 2011 as a response to a new, more fuel-efficient model from European rival Airbus.
The company billed it as an updated 737 that wouldn’t require much additional pilot training, a key selling point for what has become Boeing’s best-selling plane.
But the Max did include significant changes, some of which Boeing downplayed, notably the addition of an automated flight control system designed to help account for the plane’s larger engines.
Boeing didn’t mention the system, called MCAS, in plane manuals, and most pilots didn’t know about it.
That system was involved in two accidents that killed 346 people.
The first occurred when a Max 8 operated by the Indonesian company Lion Air sank in the Java Sea in October 2018.
The second was when an Ethiopian 737 Max 8 crashed almost directly into a field six minutes after takeoff from Addis Ababa in March 2019.
All Max planes were grounded worldwide for nearly two years while the company made changes to the flight control system. The investigations revealed what a congressional panel called a “horrible culmination” of failed government oversight, design flaws and inaction at Boeing.
PRODUCTION PROBLEMS
The Max has suffered a series of production problems.
Boeing asked airlines in December 2023 to check planes for a possible loose bolt in the rudder control system, after an international operator found a bolt with a missing nut during routine maintenance.
In another case, Boeing discovered that an undelivered aircraft had a nut that was not tightened properly.
The FAA recently told pilots to limit the use of an anti-icing system on the Max because the inlets around the engines could overheat and rupture.
Boeing recently asked the agency for a safety waiver while it develops a long-term solution. The company needs the exemption to start delivering its new, smaller Max 7 to customers.
Last year, Boeing reported a problem with fittings on Max planes where the fuselage joins the vertical tail section. Boeing said its Wichita, Kansas-based supplier, Spirit AeroSystems, used a “non-standard manufacturing process” on some of the planes.
Boeing and Spirit also said they discovered improperly drilled retaining holes in the aft pressure bulkhead, which maintains pressure when planes are at cruising altitude, on the fuselages of some 737 Max models.
Boeing said the failures could delay deliveries of some new planes but did not pose an immediate danger to those already flying.
Boeing has said it is committed to safety.
MORE ENGINE PROBLEMS
Federal safety officials are investigating an engine fire that was discovered on a United Airlines Boeing 737 Max after the plane landed in Newark, New Jersey, last June.
The flight crew noted a fire warning indication as the aircraft taxied, shut down the engine, and discharged a fire extinguisher. There was no smoke or fire visible, but maintenance crews found a fuel leak, as well as soot and heat damage.
Also under investigation is what caused the emergency landing in Wichita, Kansas, of a United Airlines flight bound for Denver on December 14. Passengers reported hearing a roar and an engine fire was discovered after landing. Nobody was hurt.
In 2021, the right engine fan blade of a Boeing 777 broke shortly after takeoff from Denver with 239 people on board. Nobody was hurt. The NTSB placed the blame on inadequate inspection of the fan blades, as well as “insufficient frequency” of the manufacturer’s inspection recommendations.
Boeing’s twin-aisle 787 has also been plagued by manufacturing problems that have sporadically delayed deliveries.
In June, the company said it was inspecting fittings on part of the tail called the horizontal stabilizer “for a non-compliant condition.”
In March, 787 deliveries were halted while federal regulators reviewed documentation of work done on new planes.