Free Republic

A plane with Hillary Clinton aboard was grounded at LaGuardia Airport Sunday afternoon after suffering an unknown mechanical issue on the tarmac, a report said. American Airlines flight 2144 to Washington DC’s Reagan Airport was forced to return to the gate about 3:15 p.m. following a mechanical issue reported by ground personnel, a law enforcement source told CNN. Another source confirmed with the network that the former secretary of state was on board. The flight’s pilots reported to authorities feeling the plane shake then saw smoke, the report said. Metal debris was later discovered in the area where the mechanical...

Hillary Clinton was aboard an American Airlines flight from New York that suffered a mechanical issue and needed to return to the gate Sunday afternoon, according to a law enforcement source. A separate law enforcement source confirmed Clinton was aboard a plane which experienced a mechanical issue that needed to return to the gate. American Airlines says flight 2144, from New York's LaGuardia Airport to Washington's Reagan National Airport returned to the gate around 3:15 pm, ET, after ground personnel saw the mechanical issue, according to the source. Pilots told authorities the plane shook and ground personnel saw smoke and...

The Export-Import Bank – the poster child for corporate welfare – was due to expire at the end of September. But it has been given a temporary reprieve while congressional leaders plot to renew it on the sly by attaching it to a must-pass spending bill, meaning the bank will never get the scrutiny taxpayers deserve. Ex-Im subsidizes export transactions using sweetheart terms – including below-market-rate loans – that are backed by the American taxpayer. According to the bank’s website, the agency provides financing when “private sector lenders are unable or unwilling to” and “assumes credit and country risks that...

From sloppy work to blown deadlines to deadly failures, the company has lost its way. It needs tough love — in the form of Congressional investigations.... Taken together, the problems with the 737 MAX, the 787 Dreamliner, the KC-46 Pegasus, the NASA Starliner, and the Space Launch System suggest systemic organizational and cultural failures that the company, unaided, appears incapable of solving... The deadly failures in the 737 MAX program alone suggest major cultural and organizational problems at the company. Though the loss of almost 350 passengers in two crashes have prompted internal investigations, media scrutiny, and an admission by...

It's no secret in Hong Kong that I was with my boss (Jimmy Lai, the owner of Apple Daily) and a few others recently walking the halls of government in Washington D.C. Saw Speaker Pelosi and other leaders in the House and Senate. Visited the State Department. Met some folks from administration, the think tanks, and of course always see the very switched on human rights groups. This week I shot down to D.C. and saw a few folks in a follow-up. All staffs and officials. Working level folks have best info. Both trips to D.C. were in regard to...

“What’s up Gene?!” Asked Rod Brown the plane’s Second Officer, who’d been close enough to witness the radioman’s reaction and now moved to his side. “The Japs have attacked Pearl Harbour!” “You’ve got to be kidding.” “No! No!” Leach insisted, “Just now… they bombed Pearl Harbour! No joke man!” Seeing the expression of horror on Leach’s face soon dispelled any doubt in Brown’s mind. And then the reality of what this meant hit him: if the Pacific was no longer a friendly sea then they were cut off. They had no route home. Brown headed towards the cockpit to warn...

A Boeing whistleblower has claimed that passengers on its 787 Dreamliner could be left without oxygen if the cabin were to suffer a sudden decompression. John Barnett says tests suggest up to a quarter of the oxygen systems could be faulty and might not work when needed. He also claimed faulty parts were deliberately fitted to planes on the production line at one Boeing factory. Mr Barnett, a former quality control engineer, worked for Boeing for 32 years, until his retirement on health grounds in March 2017. From 2010 he was employed as a quality manager at Boeing's factory in...

Dozens of older Boeing 737 planes have been grounded worldwide after inspectors found cracks in a part that connects wings to fuselages, the manufacturer said. Australian carrier Qantas grounded three of its Boeing 737 NG, or next generation, aircraft, it said Friday. “These aircraft have been removed from service for repair,” it said in a statement. Cracks in the so-called pickle forks is the latest problem to hit Boeing, which is mired in crisis over its grounded 737 Max planes after two fatal crashes. The problem does not apply to the 737 Max, which has been grounded since mid-March in...

“The 28,000 flight attendants working for American Airlines refuse to walk onto a plane that may not be safe and are calling for the highest possible safety standards to avoid another tragedy,” Association of Professional Flight Attendants President Lori Bassani said in the letter. The letter, dated Oct. 30, followed two days of congressional hearings in Washington during which lawmakers grilled Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg about the development of the 737 MAX following two crashes that killed 346 people and led to the aircraft’s worldwide grounding in March. American Airlines Group (AAL.O) is the second largest U.S. operator of the...

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz ripped into embattled Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg at a high-profile Senate hearing on Tuesday, criticizing the manufacturer’s response to two deadly 737 Max plane crashes and questioning the company’s safety culture. The Republican zeroed in on recently released internal Boeing messages that appear to show top officials raising concerns as early as 2016 about the flight-control system at fault in the crashes. In those exchanges – described by Cruz as “stunning” – Boeing’s chief technical pilot for the 737 Max told a co-worker that the system in question was “running rampant” in simulator tests and that...

From California raging wildfires and fear of more wildfires causing Pacific Gas and Electric to warn that up to 850-thousand customers...... Protesters back on the streets of Iraq today with at least 40 reported dead.... The demonstrations continuing in Lebanon..... The streets of Bolivia's capital La Paz blocked today in protest at the election result..... Some one million people reported participating in a mass rally in Santiago, Chile...... A federal judge ruling late Friday that the Justice Department must hand over grand jury materials from the Robert Mueller investigation to the Democrat controlled House Judiciary Committee.... The news late Thursday...

Investigators said faults by Boeing, Lion Air and pilots caused the crash. Five months after the disaster in October last year, an Ethiopian Airlines plane crashed, killing all 157 people on board, which led to the grounding of the entire 737 Max fleet. Faults with the plane's design have been linked to both crashes. [SNIP] What does the report say? The 353-page report found the jet should have been grounded before departing on the fatal flight because of an earlier cockpit issue. However, because the issue was not recorded properly the plane was allowed to take off without the fault...

McAllister's ouster as the head of the Renton-headquartered Boeing Commercial Airplanes unit comes after less than three years on the job and a day after Boeing's board of directors met in Texas.

"This is about manslaughter, rape and more" The words of US Senator, Democrat Ron Wyden of Oregon, speaking on the floor of the Senate Thursday. What information does the FBI have about the Saudi government's role in spiriting its citizens out of the United States to avoid criminal prosecution?..... The Federal Aviation Administration confirmed today that Boeing turned over documents it discovered "some months ago"..... The maker of Zantac recalling the product in the United States and Canada..... Johnson and Johnson recalling 33-thousand bottles of baby powder..... The State Department's internal investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's use...

KEY POINTS The FAA said Boeing withheld the messages between employees for months. The incident ramps up pressure on Boeing and CEO Muilenburg about the planes. Boeing and the FAA are facing several investigations about the 737 Max’s design and certification. Boeing shares slipped Friday after the Federal Aviation Administration said Boeing withheld for months messages between employees from 2016 regarding the 737 Max’s certification from the regulator. The plane has been grounded since mid-March after two fatal crashes. “The FAA is also disappointed that Boeing did not bring this document to our attention immediately upon its discovery,” the agency...

The initial shock was so violent from the blown engine on Southwest Airlines Flight 1380 that pilot Tammie Jo Shults thought there had been a midair collision. “We couldn’t see, we couldn’t breathe, and a piercing pain stabbed our ears, all while the aircraft snapped into a rapid roll and skidded hard to the left as the nose of the aircraft pitched over, initiating a dive toward the ground,” Shults wrote in her book “Nerves of Steel,” which was released Oct. 8. On Flight 1380 on April 17, 2018, from New York’s LaGuardia Airport to Dallas Love Field, a fan...

Boeing Co.’s board stripped Chief Executive Dennis Muilenburg of his dual role as chairman on Friday in an unexpected shake-up at the highest ranks of the company amid the prolonged crisis of its 737 MAX plane.

Boeing’s backlog of 787 Dreamliner orders was cut by 14 in September when Russian airline Aeroflot canceled its 2007 order for 22 Dreamliners — 18 of the smaller 787-8s and four 787-9s — while the company booked one new order from Air New Zealand for eight of the largest 787-10 model. The lost order is a cause for concern in Everett because the 787 backlog is dwindling fast as the company aims to roll out the planes at a rate of 14 jets per month. Boeing has been seeking new 787 orders to ensure it can maintain that high production...

The World Trade Organization ruled in favor of the United States Wednesday in a long-running dispute with the European Union over subsidies to Airbus, paving the way for the U.S. to hit the EU with $7.5 billion in retaliatory tariffs........ The U.S. and EU have been fighting since 2004 over whether their respective aerospace industry policies toward Airbus and Boeing amount to unfair practices. The WTO's ruling said the EU subsidized Airbus by giving it preferential treatment on interest rates. "The Appellate Body upheld the Panel’s findings that Airbus paid a lower interest rate ... than would have been available...

The United States will impose tariffs on $7.5 billion (€6.8 billion) worth of European imports in retaliation for illegal EU subsidies to airplane maker Airbus. The announcement came hours after the World Trade Organization (WTO) on Wednesday ruled on a 15-year-old case that the US could impose $7.5 billion in retaliatory tariffs in response to illegal EU subsidies to Airbus that hurt its American rival Boeing. Washington plans to impose a 10% tariff on aircraft imported from Europe and apply a 25% import tax on other agricultural and industrial items on October 18, the Office of the US Trade Representative...