problems at McDonnel Douglas?

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http://cnn.com/2000/US/02/20/alaska.airlines.ap/index.html

Feds had found problems at facility that made Alaska Airlines jet February 20, 2000 Web posted at: 5:32 AM EST (1032 GMT)

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- A federal audit of aircraft manufacturer McDonnell Douglas found problems at the facility that built the Alaska Airlines jet which crashed last month off the California coast.

The audit -- performed in the early 1990s -- found employees at the company's Long Beach, California, facility performed sloppy work, improperly inspected parts and used out-of-date blueprints, the Los Angeles Times reported Sunday.

The MD-83 that crashed into the Pacific on January 31 was delivered to the Alaska Airlines in May 1992.

The Federal Aviation Administration said manufacturing procedures at the plant were marred by chronic breakdowns, but the deficiencies did not threaten flight safety.

"We don't deliver an airplane unless it meets all of our quality standards," said John Thom, a spokesman for the Boeing Co., which acquired McDonnell Douglas in 1997. "We have processes in place, and there are checks along the way. It is in our own self-interest to produce quality and safe airplanes."

The crew of Alaska Airlines Flight 261 reported problems with the aircraft's horizontal stabilizer and were trying to correct them when the plane crashed, killing all 88 aboard. No official cause of the crash has been determined.

The Douglas Aircraft Co., where the plane was built, had been struggling financially at the time of the audit. The McDonnell Douglas subsidiary posted a $222 million operating loss for 1989, according to The Times, and was straining to fill orders for its jetliners.

Supervisors urged employees to improve their work in January 1991, shortly before a team of federal auditors arrived. Still, the FAA audit still found problems throughout the production line.

The MD-80 has a strong safety track record, according to FAA data. Mechanical problems with its horizontal stabilizer, however, have prompted the FAA to order mandatory inspections five times since 1988.

After the January crash, the FAA ordered the inspection of the horizontal stabilizer on more than 1,100 MD-80, MD-90, DC-9 and Boeing 717 planes, which use similar control mechanisms as the jet which crashed.

-- boop (leafyspurge@hotmail.com), February 20, 2000

Answers

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-- (kb8um8@yahoo.com), February 20, 2000.

Since the electrical engineers and programmers that designed the autopilot system got laid off during Boeing's greed-motivated merger, I doubt that they came running to the rescue when Boeing wanted to determine if the systems were compliant. In fact, Boeing probably didn't even bother checking them, since they knew that McDonnell Douglas employees could be blamed if anything malfunctioned, which is exactly what this article does.

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), February 20, 2000.

MD didn't design, build or program the autopilot. They came up with the design-to specs and then put them out for bid. If I'm not mistaken, Honeywell was the winning bidder and is the designer, builder, and programmer for that device.

WW

-- Wildweasel (vtmldm@epix.net), February 20, 2000.


Yep, and the guys who came up with those design-to specs were no longer available when the issue of compliance was considered. I don't think it is just a coincidence that we are seeing so many problems with MD aircraft, considering that the merger took place in '97, just before these businesses started to take Y2K seriously. Something obviously was lost or forgotten in the transition, and from a liability standpoint, Boeing probably can't be held liable and they know it.

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), February 20, 2000.

Weren;t htere comparable motivations suggested for the recent OILCO mergers? BP-AMOCO for example?

-- Squirrel Hunter (nuts@upina.cellrelaytower), February 20, 2000.


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