DISQUS

jr · 1 year ago

today's cut corners are tomorrow's caskets

Shannon · 1 year ago

A good time to boycott flying.......when the airlines are all out of business, and only foreignors are free to travel to all but our gulag, maybe we will see some reality written in the history books about our so called free society, the greatest country in the world, and the higest standard of living, etc., etc., that we love to pretend this country offers.

Indigo · 1 year ago

Scary.

OlderAndWiser · 1 year ago

This particular plane was 17 yrs old and corrosion had been noticed and recorded previously (not in the affected area, they said, but the inspection was not that recent); Quantas says most in their fleet are 10 yrs average. The US has an aging fleet which is even older in some cases.

Seems to me that neglecting maintenance in older planes should be a crime, although the airlines seem to think you should feel you're privileged to board an aging rustbucket.

If people had any sense at all, they'd lobby for other forms of transportation, such as rail, and get over their pompousness about having to fly everywhere. When you factor in driving to the airport, waiting in line after line, and being treated like cattle, the difference in time and treatment favors trains. Is it worth saving maybe half an hour or an hour putting your life at risk? Flying would be reserved for having to cross large bodies of water.

HowisitBushsfault · 1 year ago

OlderAndWiser-

London to Melbourne by train would be very difficult under the scenario you describe. Unfortunately, nobody notices good maintenance (except that they complain about the cost). You get what you pay for.

Bostonian_Queer_in_Dallas · 1 year ago

Okay this is off topic but fits with everything in the large picture...if you go over to Raw Story right now, there are two banner items:

1. McCain gets gush of cash from oil corps after voting to drill.
2. Hummer owners would keep going even if gasoline were ten bucks a gallon.

America, the Junior High School Nation
QED

OlderAndWiser · 1 year ago

Worse than jr high...infants who have fits when they don't get their way. Americans have this sense of privilege, prompted by money, that they should have everything they can "afford" even if it's put on a credit card. "It's my money, I should be able to spend it however I like and if people don't like it, tough titty." The American sense of "individualism" gone haywire, crowding out family, friends and neighbors, even the country, who urge conservation and frugality and less waste.

This mentality is burying us deeper and deeper. Most think oil will go on forever, don't care how much they pollute, and care not a fig for whether future generations, even their own kids, can survive on a planet that is itself in the throes of survival and will get rid of humans one way or another as the source of its sickness.

Bostonian_Queer_in_Dallas · 1 year ago

Older you said it so much more eloquently than I could. This sense of
individualism, which did give us many good things in the last century and
before, is now going to kill us slowly. Horatio Alger will need to be
revisited. Jimmy Carter began warning us and look where it got him and
us....Lee Atwater and Karl Rove and their minions made us all feel good with
"Morning in America" TV ads. Wave the flag, hand on heart, simple bumper
sticker sloganeering that made us all feel so good. And they ushered in a B
movie faux cowboy with a bad hair dye job...and Alzeimers. Greed is good.
Money is good. Restoring American values. The film "Maxed Out" really is
very scary. So is "Crude Awakening" about peak oil. And no one wants to hear
it, or discuss it. I get shut up every time I open my mouth at work or at
home. And I get very depressed. Somedays I just want to delete the A-blog
link and the others and just watch "Dancing with the Stars" like everyone
else and say fuckitall

Õ¿Õ · 1 year ago

Let them keep their Hummers. Easily identifiable. When millions are unable to drive but back and forth to work because they can't afford gas, the Hummer drivers wont last long. Eventually, those monstrocities will be gone.

HowisitBushsfault · 1 year ago

Chris in Paris-

One would think that passengers would welcome the opportunity to pay for, say, effective maintenance. Or, is Bush expected to pay for everything, not only by his crackpot supporters, but by the entire world as well?

timolo08 · 1 year ago

Chris - As the brother of a pilot I would like to thank you for mentioning the crew. Too often they are forgotten in these situations and it seems the first passenger on TV or in a paper is someone who wants to thank a higher being rather than the crew in the cabin and especially the cockpit.

Litterbox · 1 year ago

I was watching, I believe, CBS Morning News the day this happened and they had one of their 'experts' on aircraft comment on what might have happened. They showed the hole in the side of the plane and this so-called 'expert' promptly declared that it was obviously some kind of "incindiary device" (also known as scary terrorist talk) and I started laughing. He was able to pull that out of his ass after not having personally seen the plane and only hours after the event with no supporting information. I was shocked, shocked I say, to see that the talking head didnt bother to challenge such an obvious jump to a conclusion.

bargal20 · 1 year ago

QANTAS has been outsourcing its major fleet maintenance to countries like Malaysia as a cost-saving measure, over objections by unions in Australia.

The serious flaws in the quality of QANTAS's fleet maintenance has been news in Australia more than once in the past few months.