Passenger sees "wing coming apart" on United flight from San Francisco to Boston; flight forced to land in Denver
Passenger sees "wing coming apart" on United flight from San Francisco to Boston; flight forced to land in Denver

Passenger sees "wing coming apart" on United flight from San Francisco to Boston; flight forced to land in Denver

I'm normally the one voice explaining how that thing that looks scary is actually not that big of a deal.
Nope, this shit is fucked. Airlines need to be much more tightly regulated and inspections need to be much more in-depth.
At this point, I'd settle for surface level inspections. I can see that wing is falling apart from a 32 pixel thumbnail and my eyes shut.
I’ll try to keep things calm. From a pilot’s POV:
-Flight attendant says a passenger says the wing is falling apart.
-What? Oh, the slats.
-Parts coming off the airplane can damage other parts (I.e., be sucked into an engine, causing more immediate problems). Divert and execute a precautionary landing.
The plane isn’t going to fall out of the sky (unless the wing really does start to come apart) The slat is a movable part that extends the wing’s surface area to produce more lift on takeoff and landing thereby reducing required runway length. When it comes down to it you don’t really need the flaps and slats to land. Just find a nice long runway you can haul ass into. I’ve had the slats go kaput on me once. Never had them fall off though
There are guys flying these planes younger than the planes themselves. The only real thing we can learn from this is that airlines cling onto aging airplanes, which was already an open secret anyway. Nothing’s gonna change until someone dies, but the dying is not gonna be coming from the slats coming apart.
My first job I flew planes older than my dad.
Air Zimbabwe still uses the Boeing 737-200s with the Pratt & Whitney low bypass turbofan engines. The same engine that the Boeing 727 used, as well as various military aircraft from the 1960s. Everytime they fly close to where I live, I get a heart attack because the engines are so damn loud. It's honestly a miracle they still fly, but the airline is forced to use them because Zimbabwe is broke, and because apparently the 737-200 has the ability to land on gravel runways with an "unpaved strip kit" you could get from Boeing. According to Wikipedia, the kit consists of a vortex generator in front of the engine, and a gravel deflector on the nose landing gear.
Then I'll do it for you: Yes, that thing looks scary, but it's only the slat. The plane can fly without it, but the landing will have to be done at slightly higher than normal speed. The wing itself is made from much stronger material.
I'm curious about the cause, though. Could have been initiated by a bird strike.
The issue I have with this isn't the slat itself, but that the plane took off with this entirely unmanaged. Tape is fine, even missing bolts are fine, this is not something that you're just allowed to ignore. Deferred maintenance is never a good idea.
I'm not sure I'd want to be doing a faster than normal landing in a plane that's already showing signs of falling apart, but I am reassured.