Up, Up and Away

After 37 days, the FAA clears the DC-lOs for takeoff

"Today I am returning the DC-10 fleet to the air." That laconic announcement last week by Federal Aviation Administrator Langhorne Bond was received joyfully by the eight U.S. airlines that operate 138 wide-bodied DC-10 jets. For 37 days the planes had been grounded while FAA crews combed them for defects after the crash of American Airlines Flight 191 near Chicago's O'Hare International Airport which killed 273 people. Each day that the fleet was idle cost the airlines $5 million. Two hours after Bond's announcement, the first domestic DC-10 took to the air. It was United Flight 338, carrying 100 people from Chicago to Baltimore.

Bond reassuringly maintained that we have worked out strict measures to as sure that such a crash cannot occur again." Federal investigators blame American Airlines' maintenance proce dures for contributing to the disaster which was the worst in U.S. airline history. TIME has learned that the plane's No. 1 engine mount was weakened be cause of a short cut taken by mechanics in March. While they were doing routine maintenance work on the plane, they low ered engine No. 1 and its pylon, weighing a total of 18,500 Ibs., from the wing by a hydraulic forklift. Then, while the mechanics were remounting the assembly, they broke for lunch, leaving the engine and pylon suspended on the lift.

When the mechanics returned, the engine and pylon unit had shifted an almost imperceptible quarter-inch, throwing them out of exact alignment with their wing fittings. According to federal investigators, the workmen then used brute force to jam the unit into its mounting. The flange on the rear bulkhead of the pylon apparently cracked, so minutely that the fault was not detected The aircraft then flew some 100 flights before engine No. 1 ripped loose from the wing on May 25 in Chicago.

As an FAA report issued last week notes, the mechanics had ignored the maintenance instructions set forth in manuals by the DC-10 manufacturer, McDonnell Douglas. The manuals call for removing and remounting the engine and pylon separately--and preferably with an overhead lift and sling that can support the weight of the two assemblies more precisely than a forklift. Yet the FAA agreed with American Airlines that the manufacturer was aware of the one-step operation, which cuts maintenance time in half, at American hangars.

The FAA found that at least 175 engines and pylons on the 138 three-engine DC-10s operated by U.S. airlines had been removed for maintenance. In 88 cases the one-step short cut had been used, by Continental Airlines as well as by American.

In nine DC-10s operated by these two airlines inspectors discovered cracks similar to the one in the plane that crashed.

Despite the report, the legal battle over who was responsible for the crash is far from over. At stake are millions of dollars in damage suits. In Washington, American Airlines Vice President Donald J. Lloyd-Jones told a Senate hearing: "It may be that we did cause the crack." But he suggested that the problem could have originated with metal wedges used by the manufacturer to align parts that had not fitted exactly when the aircraft was built Said he: "It may be that the existence of shims in the aft bulkhead created an interference fit that made the creation of the crack inevitable, no matter what procedure was used."

During the week new cracks were found in DC-10s operated by United Continental and Trans International Airlines, but were judged not dangerous by FAA inspectors. Some cracks also turned up in another jumbo jet, a Boeing 747 operated by Pan American. These too were considered by FAA investigators to be not critical, and no reason for grounding the nation's commercial fleet of 121 Boeing 747s.

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