American Airlines fixing potentially loose seats, scraps dozens of flights

AP Photo/The Miami Herald, Carl Juste

FORT WORTH, Texas American Airlines is cancelling dozens of flights as it scrambles to fix seats that could pop loose during flights.

Airline officials said late Thursday that they had come up with a fix for the seats, and began pulling 48 Boeing 757s out of service to make repairs. All the planes should be back in service by Saturday.

The seat repairs, however, could inconvenience thousands of passengers. American said the work caused it to cancel 50 flights on Thursday and 44 on Friday. Each 757 that American operates in the U.S. has 188 seats.

It's the latest black eye for American parent AMR Corp., which is operating under bankruptcy protection and trying to fend off a takeover by US Airways Group Inc. Flight cancelations and delays surged in September, which American blamed on a slowdown by pilots who are unhappy that American canceled their labor contract.

Since last week, seats have come loose on three American Airlines flights involving two 757s that had been recently refurbished. The seats had been removed and reinstalled as part of the work.

The airline told CBS News that inspectors found a loose row of seats on six planes.

Federal officials said they are continuing a safety investigation into the events at the nation's third-biggest carrier.

American originally said the problem was due to a clamp that holds rows of seats to tracks on the aircraft floor.

But officials offered a new explanation Thursday, saying that a combination of wear, poor design and even soda spilled into the tracks caused pins to pop out of the grooves.

The airline has used the same seats for 20 years without incident until now, said David L. Campbell, American's vice president of safety.

"The fundamental design of this seat is not as robust as some of the latest designs," Campbell said in an interview.

A spokesman for the seat manufacturer, Weber Aircraft LLC, declined to comment beyond saying that his company is still investigating.

A spokesman for American said later that Campbell agreed that removing and reinstalling the seats might have hastened their failure to stay in place.

Campbell said the new fix will consist of installing an additional locking mechanism that was designed by American's engineers and approved by the Federal Aviation Administration.

The FAA issued a statement saying that it approved of American's decision to conduct more inspections. The agency said its safety investigation was continuing and it would "take additional action as appropriate." The agency is likely to examine whether American adequately inspected the seats after the cabin-refurbishment jobs.

Todd Curtis, a former safety engineer with Boeing and director of the Airsafe.com Foundation, said American made the right decision to inspect more planes once it discovered the extent of the problem.

No other airlines have reported loose seats. United Airlines doesn't use the same seat, and US Airways uses different hardware to mount seats, officials for those carriers said.

[corozalexpress]

The 757 has been in service for 30 years with dozens if not a hundred airlines, many of them of dubious maintenance pedigrees, without any significant history of seats coming loose. Now in a week we have this problem on half a dozen planes of one single airline, in some cases more than one seat on the same flight. There is a limit to coincidence, these were clearly a deliberate series of acts and the only people in a position to commit them were American's mechanics. AA management's spineless refusal to state the obvious and the union leadership's vitriolic response when an outsider did are sad reflections on both parties. On the one hand AMR shareholders need to throw these clowns out, on the other the FAA and FBI need to identify those responsible and make sure they never work on another aircraft.

[ballwyllo]

This is so heartbreaking. This airline was once one of the best. It really doesn't matter who is to blame, management or labor, between the two of them they have destroyed the best airline I have flown on. I think it is to late, I won't fly them anymore. I am lucky because I live in a major metro and always have a couple choices to choose from...I feel bad for those of you that don't have the options. But American's days are numbered.

[mjvwsr]

the same union sabotage that brought down Eastern Airlines

[rwsmith29456]

They are supposed to maintain aircraft integrity but can't screw down a seat.

[HarleyRose1959]

Where do I send my resume' to get on with one of these probably overpaid, under-qualified 'refurbishing' crews? I could do a better job with my woman-tools from the kitchen junk drawer!

[talkin2u924]

two things here to consider: a. just how many place have this problem. b. What else have this incompetent company and group of people over looked that could be a real problem...and we know nothing about it. I will never ever fly American if I can help it.