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Delta Air Lines Boeing 757 Lost Nose Wheel Before Takeoff, FAA Says (nytimes.com) 253

Posted by msmash from the can't-catch-a-break dept.
A Boeing 757 plane operated by Delta Air Lines lost a nose wheel as it prepared to take off from Atlanta's main airport on Saturday, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. It was the latest troubling episode involving one of the manufacturer's aircraft. The New York Times: Delta Air Lines Flight 982 was preparing to take off from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport for a trip to BogotÃ, Colombia, at about 11:15 a.m. Saturday when a "nose wheel came off and rolled down the hill," the agency said in a preliminary report. More than 170 passengers who were aboard had to deplane, but no one was hurt, the report said. The F.A.A. said that it was continuing its investigation.

It's been a turbulent period for Boeing, which has been fraught in recent years with safety concerns after deadly catastrophes. The manufacturer faces renewed scrutiny after a door plug blew off a new Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 MAX 9 plane at 16,000 feet on Jan. 5 just after it took off from the Portland International Airport in Oregon. No one was seriously injured then, but passengers were exposed to whipping winds on the plane's harrowing return to Portland. The F.A.A. then ordered about 170 Boeing 737 Max 9 planes to be grounded in the United States until they could be inspected. The plane that lost a wheel in Atlanta on Saturday, a Boeing 757, is a different model.
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Delta Air Lines Boeing 757 Lost Nose Wheel Before Takeoff, FAA Says More

Delta Air Lines Boeing 757 Lost Nose Wheel Before Takeoff, FAA Says

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  • Diversity! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @11:03AM (#64184485)

    Our Greatest Strength!

    • Re:Diversity! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Talon0ne ( 10115958 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @11:15AM (#64184539)

      I never got that tag line. Everyone knows UNITY is the strength, even from common phrases like 'A unified front' or to 'unify around something'. Diversity is a huge weakness in every regard except when you are talking diversity of talent to make a better whole. Like having a diverse engineering team full of product designers, developers, and test engineers. Even having different kinds of developers like those who find refactoring old code to be fun, and those who like doing the initial research... Diversity doesn't mean throw a bunch of different color people in a room and BAM! Profit! at least it didn't used to mean that.

      • Re: Diversity! (Score:4, Funny)

        by OrangeTide ( 124937 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @11:37AM (#64184621) Homepage Journal

        People want to use melanin level as the sort key, but it is a shit metric and waste of processing time.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by HiThere ( 15173 )

        You oversimplify. There are lots of situations where unity imparts strength. There are situations where diversity imparts strength. And in the majority of each of those the other is needed. You don't have a football team composed only of linemen...at least not a good one.

    • Boeing moved a lot of manufacturing to third party shops to save a buck. Machining and materials have fixed costs. If someone is doing it cheaper then there's a reason.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by dbialac ( 320955 )
        Fewer employees, especially QA personnel, and wages.

      • The idea has some merit - the machining tools can be used more efficiently since the third party shop can do machining for other customers as well, not just Boeing, so their machines are never idle. But then again, the third party shop also needs to make profits.

  • Either provide a non-paywalled article (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @11:08AM (#64184509)

    Or just don't greenlight the stories.

    C'mon, it sure ain't rocket science. Though it may be aviation manufacturing, considering the quality delivered.

  • Get real (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Virtucon ( 127420 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @11:10AM (#64184515)

    It was the latest troubling episode involving one of the manufacturer's aircraft

    The last 757 was built in 2004. How is this a Boeing issue when a maintenance problem is most likely the cause?
    I'm not a Boeing fan but these aren't 737-MAX or 737-900 aircraft.
    Also, maintenance procedures matter. One of the worst air disasters in US history was caused by maintenance crews taking shortcuts.

    The worst US air disaster in terms of loss of life was American Airlines Flight 191, which crashed on May 25, 1979, killing all 271 people on board. The plane was taking off from Chicago's O'Hare International Airport when a left engine pylon separated from the wing, causing the aircraft to lose control and crash.

    The investigation found several factors, with the main cause:

    Improper maintenance procedures: During an engine change eight weeks before the flight, damage was inflicted on the pylon structure holding the left engine to the wing due to using a forklift in an unsupported manner. This damage went undetected and subsequently developed into fatigue cracks.
    Contributing factors:

    Engine separation: During takeoff, the fatigue cracks caused the pylon holding the left engine to fail, leading to the engine detaching from the wing.

    Loss of control: The detached engine severed hydraulic lines controlling the leading-edge slats on the left wing. These slats are crucial for generating lift at low speeds, and their retraction significantly increased the stall speed of the left wing compared to the right.

    Aerodynamic stall: Due to the unbalanced lift and disrupted airflow caused by the missing engine and retracted slats, the left wing stalled, causing the aircraft to roll uncontrollably to the left.

    Limited crew response: The pilots struggled to regain control due to the lack of clear information about the situation and the severity of the damage.

    • Your comment is quite valid and, given how little we know, no conclusions should be reached. However, we usually talk about "wheels falling off" as a kind of figurative example of something being really bad. In this case, there is an actual wheel falling off of a plane. There is clearly a maintenance issue here but was it (1) The maintenance procedures were followed but they are deficient, (2) There is a design issue such that it can't be properly maintained, (3) Procedure wasn't followed. Until we kno

      • Until we know which category it's just more negative news for Boeing and, regardless of the cause, may cause the flying public to lose faith in Boeing

        Journalists are either short-selling stocks or being paid off by someone who is, so they are finding all the FUD they can. There is literally zero reason to find this story interesting.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

          Journalists are either short-selling stocks or being paid off by someone who is, so they are finding all the FUD they can. There is literally zero reason to find this story interesting.

          Or that Boeing is newsworthy so anything that happens to Boeing gets reported on.

          Boeing's been in the news a lot lately, so events that would otherwise get ignored will be amplified.

          It's just like how no one reports car fires unless they're in an EV, no one reports how ICE vehicles have difficulties in the cold weather, no on

        • I can only imagine the chaos that consumes the life of somoene who believes that a wheel coming off of an airplane is completely uninteresting.

      • There is clearly a maintenance issue here but was it:
        (1) The maintenance procedures were followed but they are deficient
        (2) There is a design issue such that it can't be properly maintained
        (3) Procedure wasn't followed

        (1) since the last fucking plane of this series was built over 10 years ago, and there haven't been tons of reports of the many many 757 planes in the world having wheels fall off... pretty sure we can rule this one out.
        (2) See issue 1, same applies. There are a LOT of these planes still in service and wheels aren't falling off on other ones.
        (3) The most likely cause.

        But it could also be:
        (4) Freak accident that hasn't happened to other aircrafts. It's entirely possible that there were stress fractures tha

        • I don't think you quite understand these things. Stress fractures don't go from zero to causing the wheel to fall off at least not if acceptable materials are using. In your scenario #4, the plane is entirely non-airworthy and needs to be permanently grounded. There will be some period of time (or number of uses) from which a stress fracture becomes detectable and when it causes structural failure. The inspection period needs to be shorter than this otherwise we'd be having aviation accidents on a daily

      • Re:Get real (Score:5, Interesting)

        by MachineShedFred ( 621896 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @02:04PM (#64185135) Journal

        The B757 was introduced in 1983 and manufactured until 2004, building over 1,000 of them. If it was a manufacturing defect or a deficiency in the maintenance procedures, we would have seen far more of it by now. Here is a list [wikipedia.org] of incidents and accidents over the span of the 757's operational life thus far - note the distinct lack of any nose wheels flying off the aircraft.

        Seriously, hundreds of these flying almost every day for 20+ years, and some of them flying for a lot longer than that.

        Operators love the 757 because it has some unique flight characteristics that make it a very desired aircraft for some routes - a narrow-body single-aisle airplane that still has a range of over 3800 nautical miles that seats ~220 passengers and only requires a 7000 foot runway for takeoff (9000 foot for the 757-300 "stretched" version). Oh, and it fits into an airport gate that serviced 727s back in the day, because that's what it was designed to replace.

        Pilots love the 757 because it flies like a racecar if you want it to, or it can fly slow and smooth if you want it to. Boeing's biggest sin is that they have tried to make the 737 do the job of the 757 which results in a 737 that doesn't do anything particularly well, and in fact does a lot of things quite dangerously - a 737 MAX has to take off and land moving 20 knots faster than a 757, on half the number of wheels and brakes.

        Boeing has been making very stupid decisions for 20+ years, but the 757 isn't one of them.

        • Another commenter made basically the same point and I had to refute them. I guess it's your turn. If the time from when a failure can be detected until the part fails is 400 flights, the maintenance/inspection interval would need to be 400 flights. If it's prescribed at 500 flights, the maintenance procedures are deficient. This is easily cured by shortening the inspection period (which happens quite regularly in aviation). Many parts (such as wheels) tend to last a *very* long time. So it's entirely po

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Junta ( 36770 )

            Ok, so we can go a bit deeper in defense of the point.

            This airframe was made in 1992. There are nearly a decades worth of older 757s in service. If it were from a 40 year old batch, then sure, one might suspect a 40 year fatigue issue to watch out for. If there were an fundamental 30 year time to failure in the engineering that was previously unknown, it should have showed up 10 years ago with the oldest 757 airframes.

            It's true we can only go so far, but I think it only fair to counter wild speculation t

    • thank you for sharing this, yeah, everyone is quick to jump to conclusions and to blame Boeing, but as you pointed out, this aircraft has been flying for about 20 years, so clearly this wasn't about Boeing leaving some bolts out, but rather about maintenance procedures not being followed correctly.

    • It was the latest troubling episode involving one of the manufacturer's aircraft

      The last 757 was built in 2004. How is this a Boeing issue when a maintenance problem is most likely the cause?

      Boeing still manufactures parts. Want to place a wager on the age of the part that failed?

      • I'll take a slightly different wager... I'll bet it doesn't come down to one part failing.

      • Wheels, landing gear etc. are usually inspected, and refurbished by third parties. This would include materials analysis (checking for wear, stress cracks etc.) What do you want to bet that Delta used a "cheap" low-cost third party to refurbish those components. [rotablerepairs.com]
        In this case the 757 was taxiing, it wasn't barrelling down the runway about to rotate. What others don't realize is how frequently wheel assemblies with tires are changed on aircraft. Why? consider how much rubber is scrubbed off on a landing; tire

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by Myrv ( 305480 )

          From https://enroute.aircanada.com/en/aviation/airplane-tires/ [aircanada.com]

          Main-wheel tires have an average lifespan of 300 to 450 landings, while a nose wheel can withstand 200 to 350. (The nose wheel wears more when it pivots left and right to turn the airplane.)

          So not once a week but a short haul flight doing multiple flights a day may see tires swapped as often as every 6-8 weeks.

      • Considering the last 757 was delivered in 2004, probably more than 20 years old if the part was original. If the part is not original, then it is more of a question of age and origin as Boeing may not have manufactured replacement parts for something like a wheel.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Junta ( 36770 )

          The tail number of the plane was N672DL, so we can also know that this one was specfically made in 1992.

          So about 10 years after the 757 started being manufactured, and about 30 years ago.

    • Exactly, this plane has been in service 32 years, with a first flight of 07/02/1992 . This is on Delta maintenance, not Boeing.
      • This story indicates we have reached the "piling on" stage of public sentiment against Boeing.

    • HOW DARE YOU! REASON WILL NOT BE TOLERATED!

      I'm expecting the next Boeing related article will be "I once rode a Boeing aircraft on a three hour flight and the seat was lumpy." followed by several pages of snark about how shit the company is.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Pascoea ( 968200 )
        I did just take a 2-hour flight on a Boeing, and I can confirm that the seat was in fact lumpy.

        • I did just take a 2-hour flight on a Boeing, and I can confirm that the seat was in fact lumpy.

          Post on X or Facebook. The press will run with it.

      • I once got off a 12 hour 747 flight FRA to SFO with Recaro coach seats, and an hour later collapsed in a parking lot from sciatica. I was not even old at the time.

  • Correlation/Causation (Score:5, Informative)

    by ebonum ( 830686 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @11:14AM (#64184537)

    Don't read too much into this. I'm not a commercial pilot, but I am a private pilot. Landing gear can take a tremendous amount of abuse, but parts do wear out. We don't know how many hard landings this plane has had since the last landing gear overhaul. 10,000 good landings will wear out landing gear parts. The airline is responsible for maintenance. Most likely, this is a 20 year old aircraft (Most 757's are old), and the failure has nothing to do with a manufacturing or design defect.

    • This wouldn't be news if there wasn't a failed door plug recently. It's the usual news cycle of keepy-uppy. Once a story takes off, you just keep bumping it with little vaguely related tidbits to fill the pages.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Nebulo ( 29412 )

        Pretty sure "plane loses nosegear upon takeoff" is going to be news no matter what the rest of the news is saying.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Junta ( 36770 )

      This 757 is in fact 30 years old (N672DL).

  • All these recent problems don't appear to be design flaws, but maintenance issues. And the blame for that lies squarely with the airlines that have been cutting costs and doing the absolute minimum to keep as many aircraft in service as possible.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by gweihir ( 88907 )

      The door plugs are _not_ a maintenance issues at all. That is just a lie on your part. The bolts on the door plugs are not supposed to need maintenance and especially not a few months after the airplane was made.

      • I think OP is referring to the last two incidents after the Alaska Airlines 737 door plug problem. There was an engine problem on a cargo airlines 747 (8 years old) and then this wheel incident on a Delta 757 (27 years old). The age of the last two planes would lean more towards maintenance than original manufacturing.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Bert64 ( 520050 )

      For maintenance issues caused by the airline you'd expect to see the same airlines having a similar number of issues with their airbus aircraft (assuming they operate any) or any other brand of aircraft they have.

      Airlines don't always do their own maintenance, often it's contracted out to others.

      • For maintenance issues caused by the airline you'd expect to see the same airlines having a similar number of issues with their airbus aircraft (assuming they operate any) or any other brand of aircraft they have.

        Airlines don't always do their own maintenance, often it's contracted out to others.

        Airbus isn't currently the dog-pile du jour. Gotta beat the company that's currently in the sights. I'd imagine an Airbus craft could literally explode on the runway full of passengers and journalists would start the article by explaining that a Boeing craft spit out a bolt that caused the explosion.

        • It actually happened. The Concorde accident was caused by a metal strip that fell off a DC-10. The Concorde type certificate was owned by Airbus at that time, just as the DC-10 type certificate was owned by Boeing.

  • A Boeing Farted (Score:3, Insightful)

    by omnichad ( 1198475 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @11:20AM (#64184565) Homepage

    I get it. Door plugs blowing off and broken MCAS systems are big news. But naming every time a Boeing plane has a routine malfunction as if it's news is just wasting people's time. It's no surprise nobody knows what's going on elsewhere in the world. We spend our time re-reading about how planes have maintenance issues over and over and over again.

    • Loosing a WHEEL of the landing gear a routine malfunction? I wouldn't call that a routine malfunction, rather it's something breaking which should never, ever break. I'd call it a critical malfunction.

      • They take a huge amount of shock. They need parts inspected and replaced regularly. It should never break if maintained but if it isn't touched for 20 years you can't call it a design defect.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by unrtst ( 777550 )

          Who said "design defect"?
          You said "routine malfunction", but then say this should never break if maintained? Planes should (and MUST) have routine maintenance, so a wheel falling off during takeoff is NOT a routine malfunction!

      • Considering the plane model in question was last made in 2004, it was not a new plane. It is a wheel that over the last 20 years should be subject to wear and tear thus it should be inspected regularly during maintenance. I would bet that parts including the tires have been replaced in the last 20 years. Thus it is more likely a maintenance problem. I believe that part of a flight check for a pilot is to visibly inspect parts like the landing gear.

      • Re:A Boeing Farted (Score:5, Interesting)

        by nightflameauto ( 6607976 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @12:54PM (#64184877)

        Loosing a WHEEL of the landing gear a routine malfunction? I wouldn't call that a routine malfunction, rather it's something breaking which should never, ever break. I'd call it a critical malfunction.

        I don't follow aircraft all that closely, but in both motorcycles and cars there are life-cycles for the most heavily used parts and best by recommendations for replacement. You better believe when it's a motorcycle I follow those to the fucking letter because I ain't faceplanting because I missed a routine part swap during maintenance.

        I would suspect somebody on a maintenance crew somewhere is getting torn to shreds after this incident. Those nose landing gear take a ton of abuse during landing. Especially with some of the "used to be a fighter pilot" pilots at the helm. Last flight I was on, which was years ago now, bounced the nose a bit he hit so hard. Granted, he also banked harder than any pilot I've ever had in a big airliner, which was kinda fun, but some folks weren't very fond of it.

        • It is possible that it was a decision from higher up to delay maintenance to save money. For example, the recommendation was to replace a part after a certain amount of cycles but the airline decided to increase the number of cycles. Of course, maintenance would be blamed for following directives.

          • It is possible that it was a decision from higher up to delay maintenance to save money. For example, the recommendation was to replace a part after a certain amount of cycles but the airline decided to increase the number of cycles. Of course, maintenance would be blamed for following directives.

            Having been in the business world for as long as I have tells me that has the ring of truth to it. I wouldn't doubt that there was a lengthy discussion over whether or not it was wise to experiment for "over recommended durations" with passengers on board that ended with a big diatribe along the lines of, "What the hell are we talking about? It's an airplane. The only time that part is used is during takeoff and landing. It's already going to be on the ground. Who cares?"

            • Also the maintenance schedule could have been modified. "Inspect every six months" is now "Inspect every 9 months", etc.

    • routine malfunction

      What is routine about a wheel falling off?

    • We spend our time re-reading about how planes have maintenance issues over and over and over again.

      Planes having maintenance issues "over and over and over again" should be big news. The U.S. prides itself on being better than other countries, including things related to safety. So if air travel in the U.S. is degrading to the point that wheels falling off of planes isn't newsworthy (whether it's the fault of the airline or the plane manufacturer), then we've fallen even further than I thought.

  • This is what happens when you put MBAs in charge instead of engineers....and I'm not the only one who thinks that [marketplace.org]https://www.marketplace.org/20... [marketplace.org]
  • .. to not fly Boeing.

  • if it wasn't so serious.

    A Boeing Sphinx model, all real with missing nose.

  • All these Boeing lossage stories are unfair to Boeing, much as I think they are losers. Boeing planes are ubiquitous. If something happens, it's going to happen to a Boeing plane. The engine fire is on the engine maker, GE. The wheel falling off is on Delta Airlines maintenance. Only the door blowing out is on Boeing.

  • I can understand why the door is a serious problem, because the plane was new, and when you buy a new car you don't expect the doors to fall off. However, if the car isn't new, don't you check the tires / wheels occasionally?

    Did the wheel come off because the service wasn't being preformed? If your wheel / tire comes off your car, you don't get to yell at Toyota or Ford (unless they did the work)

  • "You picked a fine time to leave me loose wheel... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Hans Lehmann ( 571625 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @03:09PM (#64185367)
    Plagiarized, sorry.

  • Another funny.. (Score:3)

    by sit1963nz ( 934837 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @03:26PM (#64185417)
    What sound do bolts make as they hit the runway ?


    Boeing Boeing Boeing Boeing...

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