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Simple Flying Aviation News Podcast
#292: World's Largest Airport May Drop TSA, UPS Flight 2976 Crash Investigation, & More
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Hello, I'm Channing Reed. Welcome to a brand new episode of the Simple Flying Podcast where we'll give you the lowdown on the latest news from the world of commercial aviation. Here's what we have for you this week. Coming up today, new details in the investigation of the crash of UPS Flight 2976, what the airline did in the hours preceding the tragic crash. Then it was speculated and now it's confirmed China will buy up to 200 Boeing jets after President Trump's high stakes trip. I'll have all the details. The TSA at the world's busiest airport could be a thing of the past. What Atlanta City Council is exploring instead. Those stories plus an airport in Southern California getting ready to open up its new terminal this fall. How it's representing a bright future at the airport. And finally, is a JetBlue and United Airlines merger really on the horizon? For find out why some say there's a telling sign. So now you know what's in store. Let's get on with the show and thanks for joining me wherever you are listening to our podcast this week. Appreciate you spending some time out of your week to join me. And as you can see, we have a lot to get to for the show today. We're gonna begin with those new details from the federal investigators painting a more alarming picture of the final hours before the deadliest cargo crash and UPS history. At a two day hearing in Washington this week, the National Transportation Safety Board revealed that the McDonnell Douglas MD11 that went down near Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport last November was not the plane originally assigned to for that flight. UPS Flight 2976 was scheduled to operate on a different MD11 tail number, November 260 up. But a member of the flight crew discovered a few fuel leak during a pre flight inspection. Maintenance was notified and that aircraft was declared not airworthy and a replacement plane was swapped in the last minute. That replacement, November 259 up, departed Louisville bound for Honolulu on the evening of November 4th and crashed shortly after takeoff. All three crew members were killed. So were 12 people on the ground. A total of 23 more were injured. The names of the crew? Captain Dana Dunn, Captain Richard Wurttenberg and First Officer Lee Truitt. NTSB investigators now say the crash was caused by a failure in the engine pylon, the structure that connects the left engine to the wing. A spherical bearing inside the mount cracked from metal fatigue and split apart. That shifted abnormal stress onto the support brackets which then fractured, allowing the entire engine to separate in flight. Perhaps the Most troubling, investigators have identified that at least nine prior reports of bearing race problems on the same aircraft type, many of which were never reported to the faa. The hearing is now examining whether Boeing had prior knowledge of similar structural issues and whether warning signs were missed or suppressed. The hearings come just days after the FAA cleared the MD11 to return to service following a temporary grounding. And we reported that here on simple flying FedEx looking to get that plane back into the sky this month, NTSB Chairwoman Jennifer Homendy opened the proceedings with condolences to the families of victims, many of whom were present in the boardroom. The hearing continues this week, but a final NTSB probable cause report is expected months from now. And it is just very tragic as we continue to learn what led up to this crash. And you have to think planes are subject to several different maintenance, screenings and routine reports every single month. So for some of these to not be reported to the faa, it is a little bit of alarming. And a lot of people are starting to think that this might have been more of a human error than an actual plain and structural error. When you think about how crashes happen, obviously there's a human part that plays into that, but you have to take everything into account. And looking at this, the MD11 has been flying for a very, very long time, and we haven't necessarily had seen issues like this, or maybe they have just been going unreported. But the NTSB also released new video footage of that takeoff. And if you haven't seen it, I have to tell you, it's just very jarring to watch. You can literally see the engine just fully detaching and kind of blowing up over the plane and catching fire. And it's just at that point, it's like, what can you do? There's not much you can do, especially given the geometry of the plane and just how it is. Three engines, you lose one engine and it becomes fully detached. It's a recipe for disaster. So again, very, very, very tragic. To learn more about this accident, and we'll have to see, as this investigation goes on, is there going to be anything else that we're going to learn about with this, but again, I just mentioned FedEx is planning on. They were doing test flights last week. I'm not sure if they've already scheduled the aircraft on a commercial flight, cargo flight already, but their focus is to get that plane back up into the sky, back into service. And so I feel like there's going to be all eyes on this investigation as it moves forward into making sure that this aircraft is safe. But also probably a chance for UPS to go back and look at its, its procedures and the things that it does to report these maintenance issues. Obviously we just heard that this wasn't reported to the FAA nine times. That's a little concerning. So perhaps UPS needs to go back and do its own investigation internally to see how things are reported. Again, to just avoid any type of accident like this. Again, it's just very, very, very tragic and very hard to see. Seen that video. It's all over social media and again, just prayers going out to the families of the victims that were lost in this crash and again hoping that we will turn a page in terms of safety in this industry and not have accidents like this happen again. Well, Boeing is back in China and the scale of the opening bid is historic. China's Ministry of Commerce confirmed this week on Wednesday that Beijing will purchase 200 Boeing commercial aircraft as a direct outcome of last week's summit between President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing. The announcement also confirming that the US Will provide supply guarantees for aircraft engine parts and components, a critical assurance that had been a sticking point for Chinese buyers for years. The deal ends what amounted to a nearly decade long commercial freeze. Boeing has sold only 49 jets to China since 2018, mostly freight, a fraction of more than 1,000 aircraft it sold to Chinese customers in the 10 years before the trade war began. China is the world's second largest aviation market and Boeing had projected Chinese airlines would need roughly 9,000 new aircraft over the next two decades. Trump announced the initial agreement aboard Air Force One as he departed Beijing last Friday. He said, quote, we made a lot of great trade deals including over 200 planes for Boeing with a promise of 750 planes, which would be by far the largest order ever. Now that potential 750 figure would surpass IndiGo's 500 aircraft Airbus order that's currently the largest in commercial aviation history. Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg was among a large group of American executives who traveled to Beijing with the president. Boeing confirmed the initial 200 plane commitment in a statement Friday saying it had accomplished its, quote, major deal of reopening the China market. GE Aerospace CEO Larry Culp also made the trip. Trump said GE would supply between 400 and 450 engines under the arrangement. Now the Commerce Ministry officials in a statement adding another layer, saying the two countries will seek an extension of the tariff truce that first struck in Kuala Lumpur that's set to expire in November. And will negotiate reciprocal tariff reductions on $30 billion or more of goods each. US tariffs on Chinese products under the framework must not exceed the level set in that original agreement. But caveats remain. Analysts note that Boeing faces real supply chain constraints that could slow actual deliveries regardless of the order size. Concerns about the after sales maintenance support, a long standing Chinese hesitation were specifically addressed by the engine parts guarantee. And the 750 total is aspirational. Trump suggested Xi's return, China's president, his return to Washington in September could be the focal point for finalizing the next part of this order. But for now, market that was closed is open again. And the 250 confirmed aircraft represents Boeing's single largest Chinese commitment in nearly a decade. And that is good news on that front. Right. It's always good whether it's Boeing, whether it's Embraer, Bombardier, Airbus. Right. For a manufacturer to be able to get an order of that size is great news for the business, but potentially some caveats there. And I do think that 200 is a more realistic number. We look at 750. That's quite a lot. Aspirational indeed, especially given that Boeing is dealing from supply chain constraints. And it's not just Boeing. Right. Airbus is as well. There's so much that goes into actually delivering building an aircraft and delivering it to an airline. So we could say 200, you could say eventually 750. But think of how many years down the line it will be to deliver 750 new planes. So great news. There is a little bit of aspiration there, and we'll have to see exactly how this will play out moving forward. Another interesting part of this story is there were no details on what type of planes would be delivered. Right. What planes are we talking about? 200 planes. Well, what types? You know, 730, 777. My bet is that the 777 will most likely be a part of this. I mean, when we think about it, GE Aerospace executive Larry Culp was there with the President as well as with Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg. GE powers the 777X, the GE9X. So it's likely that the 777 will most likely be a part of this order, but who knows, it could be other planes as well. That's something that we'll have to wait and see in terms of who exactly is going to be receiving these planes and which planes they'll be. But again, nonetheless, good news there. And we'll have to watch the space to see if we'll eventually get to 750 new planes. Could be many, many, many years down the road before we get to that point. While the world's busiest airport may be heading for a security overhaul, one that would be unprecedented in the history of American aviation, the Atlanta city council voted 11 to 1 on Monday to direct the Department of Aviation to commission an independent feasibility study within 90 days examining whether Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport should replace its federal TSA workforce with a private screening contractor. The resolution was introduced by council member Brian Amos, who formerly worked on the security team at Hartsfield Jackson himself. Now the trigger is, as we reported, a partial federal government shutdown that stretched from February into March of this year, during which up to 36% of TSA officers at the airport simply did not report to work. And it wasn't just Atlanta, it was all over the country. The result was a multi hour security lines, canceled flights and a deployment of ICE agents to help maintain orders. Amos framed the study in direct terms. Quote, this feasibility study is only asking what it would look like if we can better serve grandmothers standing in line all day long because our federal government can't get its act together to keep our TSA workers paid. Now, the alternative being studied is called the TSA Screening Partnership Program, or spp. It allows airports to apply to use private contractors in place of federal screeners, Though the TSA retains oversight and sets all security standards. About 20 U.S. airports already participate in this, including San Francisco International Airport and Kansas City International Airport. But there is a catch. Every single airport currently in the SPP program sits below the TSA's highest risk classification, what's known as Category X. Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport is a category X airport. It handles more than 100 million passengers a year, more than any other airport on earth. No Category X airport has ever made this transition. The feasibility study will examine costs the airport's TSA operation runs between 140 and 240 million dollars annually, as well as impacts on operations and workforce protections for TSA employees at the facility. One council member voted no. That was Kelsey Bond, citing concerns about the privatization of the public sector union jobs. Delta Airlines, which is headquartered in Atlanta, has not yet commented on the propos. If the study ultimately supports a transition and the TSA approves it, Atlanta would set a precedent that every other major American hub would be forced to reckon with. And I think that is definitely something to weigh right. We had this shutdown that caused four five hour TSA lines. Can you imagine going to the airport? I'm very lucky that I didn't have to fly during that time because that is just. I mean, we literally had people missing their flights because they were waiting in TSA checkpoints for so long. So it's obvious, and it's right as an airport to be like, how are we gonna fix this? We need to find a solution. If our government is not gonna help us, what are we gonna do? Right? And that was one of the things that we reported on San Francisco International Airport. While all the other airports in the country were dealing with long TSA lines, SFO was over here saying, hey, I don't know what y' all are dealing with, because that's not the situation over here. Right? So it could be very interesting to see this move forward. And if, you know, it does, in a sense, kind of make sense. Biggest airport in the world. So you would want things to always run smoothly as best as they can. But also, you have to take into account just the state of the government, right? So are we ever going to get into a place where we could near a shutdown again? I mean, shutdowns have happened. They've been happening for a long time, right? I mean, sometimes they get averted, but it just depends on the administration and our lawmakers as well. And so an easy solution to this would be, let's make sure that our TSA workers get paid every single time that they're supposed to get paid, and let's avoid a shutdown. But disagreements happen, and that's. That's why we ended up dealing with what we had a few months ago. So it'll be very interesting to see if this will actually move forward and what the study will ultimately find moving forward, but definitely something to weigh. As anybody in this country traveling, you want to avoid those long lines as best as you can. You have TSA prechecked, you have clear. There are a lot of ways that people are already trying to mitigate those long lines. And so I will say I have gone through San Francisco International Airport, and the security was a breeze. Now, granted, I didn't have a. It wasn't during a shutdown, but it still was a breeze. It was very nice, very organized. It was in their brand new terminal, One Harvey Milk Terminal. Fantastic facility. And so if any other airport could be like that, especially the world's busiest airport, that would be fantastic. I've never gone through TSA checkpoints at Hartsfield, Jackson, Atlanta Airport. I've only been through there on a layover. So I'm not sure if the lines are typically on a normal day. We have summer coming around the corner. Are they typically long? I'm not sure about that, but obviously during that shutdown those lines were crazy long. And so it makes you think about what you can do, the solutions that you can find to avoid that moving forward. We'll have to follow this story and see what comes out of this study. Well, one of Southern California's most beloved airports is about to get a dramatic makeover and an opening date is now on the calendar. Hollywood Burbank Airport, known by its three letter code bur, has confirmed that its brand new replacement passenger terminal will open on October 13. The $1.2 billion project has been decades in the making, driven not by expansion but by necessity. Executive Director John Hatanka Airways magazine this week that the existing terminal does not meet current FAA design standards or modern California seismic requirements. New facility, he said, was built to satisfy both and then some. So let's take a look at it by the numbers. The new terminal spans 355,000 square feet compared to the current 252,000. It'll operate 14 gates, but those gates will now be uniform in size, capable of accommodating aircraft as large as the Boeing 737 Max 10 and the Airbus A321neo. The current terminal can't handle that flexibility. Parking also gets a major upgrade. The current short term garage holds just 432 spaces. The new structure will offer more than 2,000 inside. The passenger experience changes significantly. Today's terminal forces travelers through two separate security checkpoints, one for each concourse. The new facility consolidates everything into a single eight lane central checkpoint and baggage claim, which currently includes an area that is partially outdoors. That'll move to three large, fully indoor carousels. The curbside experience is also being redesigned. Right now, arrivals and departures share the same congested roadway. The new layout separates traffic by type, isolating rideshares, taxis and private vehicles at different points. And in a nod to its location at the doorstep of the entertainment industry, the terminal's design is inspired by Hollywood and the film world. Local businesses will anchor the food and retail concession program. Critically, this project is funded entirely through airport user fees and airline charges, no local taxpayer dollars. The grand opening is set for October 13th, and if you've ever landed at Burbank and have admired the no fuss convenience, the experience is about to get a significant upgrade. And that is for sure. I have heard many stories about Hollywood Burbank Airport, someone who lives in Southern California. I've also never been to that airport before. I've just utilized other airports in the region in the LA basin. So I will definitely have to take a trip over there as this terminal nears its opening. Back to the plane types that the airport handles. It's very interesting that they mentioned the Boeing 737 Max 10. Now we know that Alaska has an order for that. So I think that's maybe a telling sign that Alaska plans to fly their 737 Max 10s to the airport. Right now, they currently fly the 737 Max 9 as well as 737900 ER, which honestly is quite surprising to me. Burbank has two different runways and they're on the shorter side compared to nearby Los Angeles International Airport or even Phoenix Sky Harbor. Denver's got the longest runways in the us so it makes for a very interesting arrival and departure. I've seen videos of those planes coming in. And if you've got a fully loaded 737, 900er, that aircraft takes a little bit of time to rotate down the Runway. So the pilots will typically depending on weight, but they'll increase the flap settings a little bit more so that they can spend less time during the takeoff roll and get up into the sky. But also just in terms of how the airport is located too, and where it is typically, if you're taking off to the south, those planes, they will take a sharp right as soon as you take off to avoid the terrain where the Hollywood sign is and all of those beautiful mountains there. So. So it is a very interesting airport, but again, it goes to show you the demand that is in the LA Basin area. There's a lot of people, there's a lot of travelers, and when you think about an airport that has a parking structure with only 432 spaces, oh, my goodness, we really need to fix that. So it'll be great to see that the modernization of this airport is moving forward. And it might become a new favorite for a lot of Los Angeles or Angelenos, I should mention, those who are flying in and out of this area a lot of the time. They will do their best to avoid Los Angeles International Airport, although sometimes it's impossible to avoid lax, depending on where you're going. But if you are traveling domestically, we've got Burbank, we've got Orange County, John Wayne Airport, we've got Long beach as well, and then Ontario International Airport, which is another great alternative for those out in the Inland Empire. So a lot of options there. And it's very nice to see that Burbank will be getting the makeover that it very much needs. That's for sure. JetBlue Airways pulling back from Newark Liberty International Airport and the scale of the retreat is raising serious questions about where the carrier is heading and whether it may eventually merge with United Airlines. I say that because there has been chit chat about this for quite some time of just United Airlines merging with anybody at this point. Right. Well, the airline announced this week that affected July 8 JetBlue announcing it will discontinue five of its 12 year round routes out of Newark. Service to Aruba, Cancun, Punta Cana, Santo Domingo and Tampa. That cuts nearly half of JetBlue's non seasonal Newark flying. The airline is also ending all operations at Manchester Boston Regional Airport in New Hampshire on the same date. That's something that we reported on over the weekend. That's going to trim additional routes from Hartford, Orlando and Providence. So where exactly is all that capacity going? The answer? Fort Lauderdale. JetBlue is adding 27 daily flights there and pushing its Fort Lauderdale schedule to nearly 130 daily departures this summer. That's more than 75% above its 2025 levels. The airline is seizing on the collapse of Spirit Airlines which seized all operations on May 2, leaving a gaping hole at Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport which was one of Spirit's primary bases. On its face, the logic sound JetBlue has long operated as a point to point carrier without the hub infrastructure to compete with full Service Network Airlines. Fort Lauderdale is a JetBlue focused city. Newark on the other hand, is United's fortress. United has the corporate contracts, the premium traffic, the international connections, the lounges and the raw schedule utility to dominate Newark in a way that JetBlue simply cannot match. And in Newark's notoriously high operating cost and a leisure heavy route structure there becomes very difficult for JetBlue to justify for that matter. But the retreat is notable for another reason. JetBlue and United already have a growing partnership called Bluesky under which the two airlines exchange Newark and New York. JFK flying share reciprocal loyalty benefits and coordinate code share options. When JetBlue cuts Newark routes where United is already strong, it starts to look less like an independent network planning and more like delay deliberate deconfliction. That perception is reinforced by recent history, of course. Or not even history, right? Just a matter of a few weeks or months. United explored a merger with American Airlines earlier this year. It was rebuffed. Attention then shifted towards JetBlue. United CEO Scott Kirby has publicly praised JetBlue's team and culture. An analyst at Seaport research is projecting JetBlue will post a $1.1 billion pre tax 2026 financial pressure that could make a deal more attractive or not. Now, when two airlines are increasingly aligned and their networks stop competing, the structural groundwork for a merger is somewhat being laid, whether intentionally or not. Neither airline has confirmed merger discussions. But in Newark today, the Runway is looking a little less crowded and the question of what comes next for JetBlue is growing harder to ignore. This is a very interesting take. The reason why I this is because we published a story on simpleflying.com a few weeks ago, more like last month over how JetBlue's founder David Neeleman, who is the founder of multiple airlines, including the very successful Breeze Airways Neilman, saying that united or that JetBlue has a lot of debt, up to $9 billion in debt and projecting that United doesn't want to take that on. That was one of the reasons why a merger is not necessarily on the horizon or in talks right now because of how much money JetBlue, how much debt JetBlue has. So it's very interesting when we look at how the airline cuts back. I don't necessarily think that this has anything to do with the merger. I could be wrong and maybe the headline next week or next month will prove me wrong. But I do think that this is more of a spirit rescue type of situation. Right. JetBlue is not a huge airline. It's not big like the Big Three. So if they're going to add capacity somewhere else, they've got to take back. They've got to pull back somewhere too. And Newark has been a place where JetBlue has added and then has taken back, has added and then has reduced flow flights. I remember, I believe it was in 2024 they stopped flights between Newark and Los Angeles, which is a market and a route that not only JetBlue served, but United served as well as Spirit and Alaska Airlines. So they pulled back and here we are now in 2026 and they're flying that route again. So there's a lot that an airline of JetBlue size has to weigh when it comes to routes and capac capacity and competition as well. It will be very interesting to see though how this Blue sky partnership will continue to move forward. United has already confirmed that they're planning on returning to New York JFK Airport, which is really where that's JetBlue's powerhouse. It's just going to be like a topsy turvy situation. You look at New York, JFK, that's where JetBlue dominates. You look at Newark, that's where United dominates. And how are the two going to to get along there? So it will be very interesting. One of the things that I will also mention is that JetBlue is, although small, they do offer a really great premium product for passengers on routes that you might not have a really upscale premium product on with other airlines. Right. So I mean, Newark is out of the Newark, Newark to Los Angeles kind of out of the question because you have United that has lie flat seats in their Polaris, Polaris business class. But let's take Los Angeles to Fort Lauderdale for example. That's a route that JetBlue flies. And actually United is also planning on flying that route very soon. Delta also flies that route too. But JetBlue is the only carrier that offers lie flat seats on that route. So they have a way of kind of punching in terms of, hey, look at our product, look at what we can offer compared to what the legacy carriers are operating. Now I do want to mention that United has not confirmed which aircraft they're planning on flying between Los Angeles and Fort Lauderdale, but it most likely will be an aircraft that does not have lie flat seats. Unless maybe they decide to put their Coastliner Airbus A321neos on that route eventually. But that's a little bit down the line before we get those aircraft in the fleet. So a lot to weigh here. It'll be very interesting, but I think from my perspective, doesn't look like this is a telling sign of a merger. But what do you think? Feel free to let us know as we continue to track this development. Well, that's going to do it for today's podcast. We hope you enjoyed it and we welcome any feedback you might have@editorialimplifying.com and for more great content, you can visit our website@simplifying.com or find us on social media. Simply search for simplify. And if you enjoyed this podcast, please leave us a rating on your favorite podcast player. Thanks for listening.