Alaska Airlines' CEO ‘Angry’ at Boeing, While United Reconsiders Adding New Planes to Future Fleet

24.01.2024 - 20:25 / travelandleisure.com / Scott Kirby / Ed Bastian / Airlines

CEOs of both Alaska Airlines and United Airlines have expressed frustrations with Boeing weeks after a mid-air blowout forced the airline to ground dozens of its planes.

Alaska’s CEO Ben Minicucci told NBC News in an interview he was now sending his own staff to audit Boeing’s production line. That’s in addition to the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) decision to explore using an “independent third party to oversee Boeing’s inspections and its quality system."

“I’m more than frustrated and disappointed,” Minicucci said. “I am angry. This happened to Alaska Airlines. It happened to our guests and happened to our people. And — my demand on Boeing is what are they going to do to improve their quality programs in-house.”

He added: «We’re sending our audit people to audit their quality control systems and processes to make sure that every aircraft that comes off that production line, that comes to Alaska has the highest levels of excellence and quality.»

The sentiment comes weeks after an Alaska Airlines 737-9 MAX aircraft suffered a dramatic mid-air blowout of a plug door panel on a flight from Portland, Oregon, to Ontario, California, on Jan. 5. The FAA has since grounded the planes until it can approve the aircraft manufacturer’s inspection and maintenance process.

Since the incident, both Alaska and United Airlines, which also counts dozens of the aircraft in its fleet, have found loose bolts and hardware, and both airlines have been forced to cancel hundreds of flights.

United CEO Scott Kirby said during the airline's earnings call this week he was reconsidering ordering Boeing 737 Max 10 planes in the future, the next and larger iteration of the aircraft.

“We are taking it out of our internal plans,” United CEO Scott Kirby said, according to Skift. “We’ll be working on what that means with Boeing. But Boeing is not going to be able to meet their contractual deliveries on at least many of those airplanes.”

Additionally, Kirby told CNBC that «the Max 9 grounding is probably the straw that broke the camel’s back for us. We’re going to at least build a plan that doesn’t have the Max 10 in it.»

However, Delta Air Lines’ CEO Ed Bastian has also told CNBC he is confident in the 100 Max 10s the carrier has ordered. 

“We certainly will not take them ’til we have 1,000% confidence that that plane is fully secure, fully safe and … everyone has signed off to that,” Bastian said, adding, “Boeing is such a vital part of our industry, our history, and we need them to succeed.”

Last week, Boeing announced that it appointed a special advisor to “conduct a thorough assessment of Boeing's quality management system for commercial airplanes, including quality programs and practices in Boeing manufacturing