Leaving aside the big stuff—like the Southwest Airlines computer glitch that grounded or delayed hundreds of flights over the weekend—it’s been a tough couple of days for flying.
Monday, on an Alaska Airlines 737, a credit-card reader powered by a lithium-ion battery started smoking during a flight. The plane, on its way from Newark to Seattle, made an emergency landing in Buffalo with 200 passengers on board. The flight crew was able to extinguish the fire themselves. The manufacturer of the card readers says “we believe this to be a very isolated incident.” You bet. Meanwhile, that model is being recalled from all planes.
Yesterday, another emergency landing. An SAS flight from Stockholm to Chicago made an emergency landing in Greenland. The plane, an A330 with 146 passengers, had no problem with its credit-card equipment; this one had smoke in the cabin coming from a short-circuited coffeemaker. Passengers, who were told to remain seated with their seatbelts on, stayed at a hotel overnight and then continued to Chicago. Hopefully with coffee…
Meanwhile, on Sunday morning, a Singapore Airlines A330 didn’t even get off the ground to test its coffee…while undergoing a routine pre-flight safety check in Singapore before a flight to Hong Kong, The carrier told reporters that the nose landing gear “retracted while the aircraft was undergoing a landing gear system check.” Yeah, we noticed that…
