Airlines ordered to check safety of MD-80s

ATLANTA — The Federal Aviation Administration is ordering U.S. airlines to conduct safety inspections to look for cracking on overwing frames on certain MD-80 series aircraft, which could be a headache for an industry reeling from soaring fuel prices.

The airworthiness directive affects 670 MD-81, MD-82, MD-83, MD-87 and MD-88 aircraft registered in the U.S.

American Airlines has 212 MD-82s and 86 MD-83s; Delta Air Lines has 117 MD-88s.

Representatives of both carriers said their airlines would comply with the directive, which requires the inspections on the affected aircraft and all applicable corrective actions to be completed within two years or before the accumulation of 20,000 total flight cycles, whichever occurs later. Repeat inspections will be required thereafter at regular intervals.

The directive, which the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) estimates will cost U.S. operators $214,400 per inspection cycle, resulted from reports of cracked overwing frames. It takes effect Aug. 12.

The FAA says such cracking could sever the frame, increase the loading of adjacent frames and result in damage to adjacent structures and loss of overall structural integrity.

In April, American grounded its MD-80 fleet for inspections related to electrical wiring as a result of an FAA safety audit. More than 3,000 flights were canceled, costing the airline tens of millions of dollars in lost ticket sales. At the time, Alaska Airlines, Midwest Airlines and Delta canceled some flights on MD-80 series aircraft.

The Air Transport Association, on behalf of Delta, argued that the FAA's estimate of the amount of hours it will take to do the inspections is significantly lower than the actual hours it would take Delta to inspect the majority of its MD-88s. The FAA disagreed.

The notice of the airworthiness directive says the action is interim. It says the manufacturer is developing a modification that will address the unsafe condition identified in the directive. Once the modification is available, the FAA may consider additional rule making.

Also

Federal officials say a bird did not cause a large dent in the nose of a Northwest Airlines plane that landed in Tampa, Fla.

FAA spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen said the aircraft's fiberglass nose cone and an antenna have been shipped to Minneapolis, Minn., for analysis.

Bergen says the crew aboard Flight 478 from Detroit reported a loud bang Monday and then the aircraft's radar became inoperative. The plane landed safely.

A Tampa International Airport spokeswoman initially blamed the dent on a bird. But Bergen says the crew reported the bang while flying at 18,000 feet — an altitude too high for a bird.