What plane am I booked on? Boeing blowout puts flyers on edge

Hotel: check. Rental car: check. Plane tickets? Hold on... which aircraft am I on?

The do-list for planning a getaway is getting more complicated for some travelers after the latest safety crisis with Boeing Co. and its 737 Max 9, when a door-sized panel blew out on Alaska Airlines Flight 1282.

“I don’t normally pay attention at all to what type of plane I fly on, but the viral video of the plane with the missing door caused me to check,” said Victoria Eastberg, who is due to fly on a Max 9 with United Airlines Holdings Inc., the subtype’s biggest operator, from Orlando to San Francisco next week. 

While most of the Max 9 fleet is currently grounded, her flight is still scheduled. Eastberg, 25, is concerned about getting on, as Boeing, Alaska and United work to quickly lift the stoppage. She’s also worried about where she sits. 

“My row is very close to the row where the panel blew out,” Eastberg said. “And I’m in a window seat, which is extra concerning for me.”

While there’s always been a small cohort of aviation geeks familiar with every aircraft type, the broad traveling public hardly cares which jet they board, more concerned with the airline and the price to get from A to B. With social media providing instant interaction between companies and consumers, and with the images of a gaping hole in the side of an airborne plane fresh on people’s minds, more people are digging into the finer points of their upcoming trip.

The Jan. 5 accident has thrown Boeing into a fresh crisis, and reawakened fears about the planemaker’s flagship 737 Max lineup. Passengers have lit up customer-service threads on social-media and fashioned themselves into amateur planespotters over concerns about the beleaguered jet. 

Carriers say they’re fielding more questions about aircraft types following the midair accident. Executives from Ryanair Holdings Plc’s Michael O’Leary to Emirates’ Tim Clark have called on Boeing to improve quality control. 

Hong Kong startup Greater Bay Airlines, which last year ordered 15 of Boeing’s 737 Max 9 aircraft, said it was “highly concerned” about the Alaska incident. It went on to say the Boeing 737-800 it is currently flying was “totally different,” and had “a safe and sound flying record.” 

Posts on social media since the weekend encapsulate fliers’ concerns — some users said they were nervous about flying on a 737 Max, while others plan to avoid booking with airlines who operate Boeing’s mainstay narrowbody. Some said they would search for flights with Airbus SE planes going forward.

Boeing Chief Executive Officer Dave Calhoun tearfully acknowledged in an all-hands safety briefing Tuesday that the US planemaker has had to reassure its customers since the accident, saying “moments like this shake them to the bone.”

Calhoun, 66, has worked to restore Boeing’s reputation after two deadly crashes nearly five years ago led to a worldwide grounding of the 737 Max, the manufacturer’s biggest source of revenue.

Boeing said in a statement it was committed to ensure all its planes meet design specifications and high safety and quality standards. “We regret the impact this has had on our customers and their passengers,” it said.

Picking one’s way through a thicket of aircraft types and options is no easy task. 

The 737 Max 9, a stretched version of the baseline Max 8, is the one that’s been grounded, but not all of the 215 Max 9s in the global fleet are affected, based on Cirium data. 

The FAA has singled out models that use door cutouts with plugs, like Alaska Air Group Inc. and United have done. Other airlines that install actual emergency exits aren’t affected.

It can get even more complicated. In Europe, Icelandair Group HF operates the Max 9. It said in a statement that inspections aren’t required because its planes are set up differently than the ones involved in the grounding.

Like United and Alaska, the Nordic carrier doesn’t use the mid-aft emergency exits. But it fills the space with deactivated doors, rather than the plug-type fillers involved in the FAA action. The difference can be seen from the exterior — the Nordic carrier’s jets show portholes, while United and Alaska’s have full-sized window cutouts.

A spokesman for Icelandair said the airline has responded to the “very few” queries it’s had by reassuring passengers that it has a different configuration. 

The repercussions of the Alaska Air incident have spread to operators who don’t have any Max 9 jets in their fleets. 

Most carriers operating the newest 737 have the Max 8 version, which don’t have the plugs.

The predecessor to the Max 9, called the 737-900, can also have door plugs but those aren’t subject to the grounding. To add to the confusion, the older 737s are known as Next Generation.

German travel firm TUI AG doesn’t operate the Max 9 but has been fielding queries from travelers. Ryanair, meanwhile, said it has no Max 9 aircraft in service or on order, and didn’t expect the grounding to have any impact on its fleet.

“If you are nervous, there are ways to check what sort of plane you will be traveling on before you book, such as checking via Google Flights,” said Rory Boland, editor of consumer site Which? Travel. “But there are no guarantees because airlines can swap planes around to suit demand.”

The scrutiny of the Max 9 will reinforce the case for airlines to operate mixed Boeing and Airbus fleets, said Agency Partners analyst Sash Tusa. Nevertheless, he said, the reality remains that most of the flying public is blissfully unaware of which plane they are flying on. 

“The vast majority of passengers have no idea what they’re flying on and never will,” Tusa said. “They look at how to get from point A to point B and do it on price.”