Days after an Alaska Airlines flight had a door plug fly off its fuselage mid-flight, three unnamed United Airlines employees say they’ve discovered loose plugs on five more Boeing 737 MAX 9 aircraft, The Air Current reported. The plane in question was grounded nationwide by the Federal Aviation Administration while the cause of the Alaska Airlines incident is being probed. Potentially complicating that investigation, however, is the absence of audio from the flight’s black box cockpit recorder, which authorities say was never turned off after the air emergency and had its audio overwritten. Customers aboard Friday’s nightmare flight, which landed without anyone being injured, have been given given $1,500 and refunds from the airline, The Messenger reported Monday, citing a passenger. If each of the flight’s 171 passengers were compensated equally for the terrifying incident, which included some passengers’ phones being sucked through the gaping hole, Alaska Airlines would have dished out approximately $250,000 in apology money.
