Hole in Southwest jet blamed on metal fatigue

DALLAS - DALLAS (AP) - Federal investigators say metal fatigue caused a hole to rip open in the roof of a Southwest Airlines jet as it cruised at 35,000 feet last year.


Southwest spokesman Brad Hawkins said Thursday that the airline agreed with the board's findings and had increased visual inspections of that area of the skin on its planes.

The plane bound from Nashville, Tenn., to Baltimore on July 13, 2009, lost cabin pressure, causing oxygen masks to drop in front of passengers. The pilot made an emergency landing in Charleston, W.Va. There were no injuries among the 126 passengers and five crew members.


Southwest got the plane in 1994 - it's much older than the average Southwest jet - and had flown it for 50,500 hours and made 42,500 takeoffs and landings before it sprang a hole in the roof, according to the safety board report.



Hawkins, the Southwest spokesman, said the airline was complying with all new safety regulations developed by Boeing and the FAA since the Charleston incident.

"We've taken aggressive measures to incorporate additional maintenance inspections ... in response to what was learned from Flight 2294," he said.


Metal fatigue has caused catastrophic accidents. In 1988, cracks caused part of the roof of an Aloha Airlines Boeing 737 to rip open in flight and a flight attendant plunged to her death. That accident led to tougher inspection rules.
