AvTalk Episode 326: Diversions and diversion tactics

AVT 326 Transcript
EPISODE 326
[EPISODE]
[0:00:08] IP: Hello, and welcome to episode 326 of AvTalk. I am Ian Petchenik, here, as always
with –
[0:00:17] JR: Jason Rabinowitz. Hello, Ian. I assume you're still there and have not melted.
[0:00:22] IP: I have not melted. I melted a little bit earlier this week, but I have reconstituted the
puddle that was formerly me, and I'm back in action.
[0:00:31] JR: That's good.
[0:00:32] IP: We sent the heat your way.
[0:00:34] JR: Yes, thank you. Please stop doing that. We don't want any more. But it's hot here.
I know it's been hot in Europe. It's hot all over.
[0:00:42] IP: It's just hot.
[0:00:43] JR: Welcome to summer. As soon as we entered summer solstice, it became hot.
Right on cue. Can’t be mad.
[0:00:50] IP: Right on cue. Yeah. Last week was busy for all the wrong reasons. This week is
thankfully, a little less busy. We don't have a major crash to talk about, thankfully. We will have
some updates later in the program on Air India Flight 171.
[0:01:14] JR: Kind of.
[0:01:14] IP: And some things to say about the updates, or lack thereof. But we do have plenty
of updates.
© 2025 AvTalk 1
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:01:21] JR: Quiet weeks are good weeks. I’ll take it.
[0:01:24] IP: I’m not sure if I’ll call this quiet.
[0:01:26] JR: I don't know if it was a good week, but quiet aviation news-wise. There was some
headlining stuff, but I went to Boston and back in one day and it was fine. Nothing happened.
Everything was early. Therefore, everything else in the world must have also been fine.
[0:01:41] IP: That's quite the extrapolation. I appreciate that from you.
[0:01:44] JR: Yes. I'll take it.
[0:01:46] IP: Let's basically pick up where we left off last week, where we explained the
massive influx of tanker and transport aircraft from the United States into bases in Europe and
the Middle East. We left off saying, hopefully, this is just some posturing. It turned out that that
wasn't in fact the case. The US on the 21st of June conducted an attack on three Iranian nuclear
facilities using a contingent of B2 bombers, fighter escorts, and “dozens of tanker aircraft.”
Those aircraft, the B2s, that is, departed Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri, flew east and
dropped the Massive Ordnance Penetrator, the 30,000-pound world's largest bomb on three
nuclear sites and returned after about 36 hours total flight time. But that's not what we thought
was going to happen, is it, Jason?
[0:02:52] JR: No.
[0:02:53] IP: Because the US Air Force conducted one of the most expensive, hey, look over
there, routines ever.
[0:03:02] JR: Yeah. We can't afford healthcare, but we can afford to fly B2 bombers from
Missouri to Iran and back as made you look.
[0:03:10] IP: Well, to be fair, the diversion didn't go all the way to Iran. They stopped off in
Hawaii. So, that was fun.
© 2025 AvTalk 2
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:03:15] JR: Oh, that's nice.
[0:03:16] IP: Here's what happened. At 3.13 UTC on June 21st, so that's the evening before at
about 10.13 local time. In Oklahoma, a bunch of KC-135s took to the air. Almost immediately,
they jumped to the FlightRadar24 most-tracked flights list. Then, because they were flying east
and everyone was like, “Well, maybe something's going to happen.” They were flying east
through southern Missouri, and then they turned north, and basically, flew to Whiteman Air
Force Base in a single row.
Then as soon as they turned west from Whiteman Air Force Base, they fanned out as if they
were, I don't know, maybe conducting aerial refueling operations with aircraft that are based at
Whiteman Air Force Base. Their aircraft based at Whiteman Air Force Base happened to be the
B2 Spirits. Everyone's following these tankers. They're at the top of the most-tracked flights list.
People that are listening to ATC are hearing call signs and things like that going, “Okay, we
know what these tankers are doing.” They gas everybody up and go back to Oklahoma. Then
there's a second flight of tankers that appear off the coast of California that are also refueling. It
turns out, that was all a diversion. Because the aircraft actually conducting the operation on the
nuclear facilities in Iran were flying east. All of the tankers involved in that were not broadcasting
Mode S, or ADS-B, until they were on the way back.
On the way back, the flight of B2s was gassed up over the Mediterranean Sea. At least, that's
when we started to see things on ADS-B. There was a bunch of KC-135s over the
Mediterranean west of Chania. Then there was another group about six hours later of 10
KC-135s and KC-46s near the Azores. Then, of course, the announcement came of what had
happened. That was the 21st of June.
Two days later, Iran launched their counterattack, attacking US bases in Qatar. One of the US's
largest air bases in the Middle East is based in Qatar, Al Udeid Air Base. It's also the home of
multiple forces and the US command. Missiles were launched from Iran at the US base there,
airspace in Qatar, the UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, and portions of Saudi Arabia that form a horseshoe
around Dammam, along the coast. That all closed, and everybody had to scramble and figure
out where to go. I will say, that the Bahrain controllers did an incredible job getting aircraft out of
the airspace.
© 2025 AvTalk 3
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:06:18] JR: Yeah. Having to divert the entire, basically, operational fleet of Qatar Airways,
Etihad, Emirates, and all the others in the region is just, I'm not going to say unprecedented,
because there's precedent for it in the past. But having to do that without much of any warning,
you need a couple of cups of coffee, a couple of pots of coffee that day, probably. Then, to deal
with all of the recovery flights, bringing all those aircraft back home. So, not just the diversions,
but figuring out how to get all those aircraft back, on top of the flights that were already in route
that weren't diverted, but were still on the way, that's no small feat, whatsoever. Correct me if I'm
wrong, Ian, but I believe the airspace was closed before the Iranian air strike happened. Do I
have that timeline right?
[0:07:04] IP: Kinda, sorta. It sounds like what happened is Iran called the, “Hey, we're going to
launch some missiles at you hotline,” and said, “We're going to launch some missiles at you.”
They said, “Okay. We'd rather you didn't. But if you have to, thanks for letting us know.”
[0:07:22] JR: If you must. Thanks for that. I mean, that's nice. That's not nothing. We can't
discount that, because there would have been a lot of airplanes in the path between Iran and
the base in Qatar.
[0:07:35] IP: Yeah. I mean, it was still a real-time scramble.
[0:07:40] JR:  Yeah. It was still a, hey, figure this out. You've got a few minutes. But some
warning is better than no warning, of course. Because it would have been a lot of aircraft in the
way.
[0:07:48] IP: Yeah, exactly. There was a Flyadeal flight that was left hanging. I'm not sure what
their deal was, but they circled, basically, in the middle of the Gulf in the far eastern edge of
Bahrain's FIR, and just tried to figure out what to do before finally heading back west. I'm not
sure what took them so long, but I think there were something like 200,000 people at some point
tracking that flight. It was FlightRadar24’s busiest day ever.
[0:08:15] JR: That's something.
© 2025 AvTalk 4
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:08:16] IP: I think it says something about the interest in what's happening. Let's talk about
some diversions.
[0:08:22] JR: This is where it gets devastating.
[0:08:24] IP: Yeah. Into Doha. This is just flights that were bound for Doha. We'll talk about
other flights in just a minute, but this is just flights that were bound for Doha. 102 diversions
overall. I'll do it by country, and then we can break down some of the airport-specific diversions.
This is, let's see, 18 to Turkey, 15 to India, 13 to Oman. A bunch went back to the UK and other
Western European, I guess, origins, not destinations. Specifically, Muscat took in 11 aircraft,
Istanbul took in 10, Jeddah took in nine, Medina six, Dammam six, Bangalore five, Abu Dhabi
four, Hyderabad four, and Bahrain three.
Then, there were a few rather interesting diversions overall that weren't necessarily bound for
Doha, but were affected by the airspace closure and the congestion created by the closure of
those airspaces. The most impacted one, I guess, would be Qantas’s QF 33, which was on its
way from Perth to Paris, and went back to Perth landing after about 15 hours.
[0:09:42] JR: That's just awful. Yeah. Ouch. Then, they'd have to do it all over again. It's not just
15 hours of pain, but now there's a whole lot more coming soon. That's, oof.
[0:09:55] IP: Yeah. QF 9 from Perth to London also diverted, but they were a bit further along in
their journey. They diverted to Singapore. This was on the 23rd. They left Singapore today on the
25th of June, finally making it to London two days later. A rough trip there as well, but knowing
Qantas, I'm sure the passengers were well taken care of, or at least I hope they were.
[0:10:22] JR: I think we talked about this before. We had mentioned that some of the US
airlines had travel waivers, or maybe we just talked about this in our text thread, but travel
waivers, or suspensions to –
[0:10:33] IP: I think we touched on it last week.
© 2025 AvTalk 5
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:10:34] JR: I think we talked about it, but United is currently planning on resuming flights to
Dubai, July 3rd, until of even August 1st. I'm pretty surprised about the Dubai suspension all the
way until July 3rd. That seems quite conservative and I'm actually a little surprised why they
have –
[0:10:51] IP: I think July 3rd is the standard date that a lot of airlines are using.
[0:10:56] JR: Yeah.
[0:10:57] IP: It seems to me that that's just what was chosen.
[0:11:01] JR: Yeah. Also, American service, I think from Philly to Doha, not sure what the deal is
with that one at all. Yeah, there are still definitely some impacts here for the US airlines to the
Middle East, where they don't have a huge presence and now there's really none again. Maybe
it comes back. I hope it does, but we'll see.
[0:11:19] IP: Yeah. I mean, one assumes they'll bring it back as soon as they feel comfortable
doing so. There was also a couple of interesting diversions, not diversions to alternate airfields,
but just re-routes in progress. Most interesting one to me was the Turkmenistan Airlines from
Medina to Ashgabat, where they got all the way into the UAE, or near the UAE and then had to
fly back west and then south and east and all the way around. Having already lost access to
Iranian airspace, what had been, I think, a five-and-something-hour-long flight, ended up being
closer to eight when it was all said and done. Just a rough bit of flying for them. Again, I mean,
just an incredible job by the air traffic controllers clearing that airspace and helping aircraft figure
out where they needed to go.
And all manner of aircraft, because, I mean, one of the aircrafts that diverted was a fully laden
A380 out of Abu Dhabi, one of the A380s. Then you're trying to slot in flydubai 737s and all sorts
of things, and just the controllers doing a ton of work to figure out where they could send aircraft
and what was still open. Really impressive. Okay. What's happening now? Jason touched on
the American, or US-based carrier flights, but we've got some European news as well. Generally
speaking, Tel Aviv is reopening. They are in the process, European airlines are in the process of
© 2025 AvTalk 6
AVT 326 Transcript
announcing when they'll be restarting flights. Nothing definitive across the board yet, but we'll
see where that goes.
Iraqi airspace has reopened and there are a number of carriers that have resumed using Iraqi
airspace, including Turkish Airlines, flydubai, Air Arabia, Kuwait Airways, and both Syrian
carriers, so Syrian Air and Cham Wings. We've also got Iranian airspace kind of open. There's a
line that Iranian authorities have drawn that cuts Iran into thirds, I guess is a good way to put it.
The Western two-thirds of Iranian airspace is still closed to traffic, except international flights
that are bound for Tehran and “special domestic flights.” I'm not sure what those would entail,
but –
[0:13:52] JR: You know you're not on one.
[0:13:53] IP: Yeah, there you go. The easternmost third, so basically, the area of Iran that is
east of Dubai, that airspace is open and is starting to be used again, Flydubai being the first
foreign carrier to use a running airspace on their way to Bishkek and Moscow. That has
happened in the hour before we recorded. I'm sure there will be more updates. Emirates and
Qatar are still going around both Iran and Iraq for the moment. They have both said that they
will make a determination based on all of the evidence and how safe they feel sending their
aircraft into those airspaces, but they have not said when they might restart operations there.
That's where we are now after the US attack on Iranian nuclear facilities. The Iranian response
on US bases in Qatar and a ceasefire that seems to be holding between Israel and Iran.
Hopefully, next week we can come back and say, everything's open again.
[0:15:06] JR: Sure. Sure. It's going to be a long week.
[0:15:09] IP: They all are these days.
[0:15:11] JR: Yeah. That's the truest thing you've ever said.
[0:15:15] IP: Let's switch gears and get even angrier about things. Because this one, I'm a little
boggled by. The crash of Air India flight 171 happened about two weeks ago now, and we know
© 2025 AvTalk 7
AVT 326 Transcript
nothing. That's not to say that we know nothing, because that would still be fine. If we, you and
I, Jason and our listeners, who I assume no one listening to the podcast is an Indian Air
accident investigator, although if they are, this little rant is for you. They still haven't listened to
the black boxes.
[0:15:54] JR: Or if they have –
[0:15:55] IP: They haven't said anything about it.
[0:15:56] JR: Weren’t saying anything.
[0:15:58] IP: As of yesterday, so the 24th of June, A&I in India is reporting the Civil Aviation
Ministry of India as saying, that the combined cockpit voice and flight data recorder are still in
India and they are still deciding on where to review that data.
[0:16:25] JR: Did they happen to mention why they are still reviewing where to send it to?
[0:16:29] IP: The ministry said, “After due assessment of all technical, safety, and security
considerations.” I have no idea what that means.
[0:16:41] JR: Is that it? I thought there was going to be more to that sentence. It doesn't make
much sense. You either do it in India, you send it to Washington, to the NTSB to do it, or that's
really it. What are your other options here?
[0:16:53] IP: There are no shortage of labs that could do it.
[0:16:55] JR: Yeah. It's a Boeing aircraft. Obviously, the US has an interest here in doing it. So,
you can send it to the NTSB. They're more than capable. You can send it to France. You can
send it to the UK. Send it lots of places. But if they are actually just simply sitting on it while they
figure out where to send it, that's extremely not okay, for lack of better terms.
[0:17:17] IP: Or, having said that they remain committed to full transparency in the inquiry, they
can say, “We're still deciding where to send it, because –”
© 2025 AvTalk 8
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:17:28] JR: Yes, it should not take this long to decide where to send it at all, because if there
is actually the off chance that there is something endemic to the 787, or to the engines, we need
to know about that. Spending a week simply deciding where to send the thing to read it is not
okay, because usually, by this point, we have at least some indication, potentially, of what
happened, or there have been – If this was in the US, the NTSB would have been holding a
press conference at least once a day at this point, to the point where there is no more relevant
information to disseminate. That has just been commonplace.
What's happening in this vacuum of really any actual information coming out is nonsense
coming out. Literal nonsense. Jon Ostrower’s The Air Current put out a piece today, I believe,
about this situation, where basically, AI slop, as it's known, is filling the void of information in the
crash investigation. People are, I don't want to say, falling for it, but they're falling for it. People
are generating entire fictitious reports that look very real, but are obviously not, because India
apparently hasn't done anything to this point, that at least publicly acknowledged anything. This
is not good. Silence is pretty much the worst thing you could do in the modern information-
hungry society. You just can't do this. I don't understand it.
[0:19:04] IP: I don't either. The first, I don't know how, I guess, the EAFR, the Enhanced
Airborne Flight Recorder, so it's the combined cockpit voice and flight data recorder. The first
one was found on the 13th of June. The other one was found on the 16th of June. We are nine
days after the second one was found, and they still have not cracked them open to see what's
inside.
[0:19:30] JR: Or if they have, they are – Yeah.
[0:19:33] IP: They've done this.
[0:19:35] JR: Not great. I expect better out of a country like India. This has real Chinese vibes,
where maybe something's happening, maybe it's not, but they're not really going to tell us. You
expect that out of a country like China. I don't expect that out of a country like India, especially
as they're trying to reshape Air Indian to this true global competitor. They're not doing the new
© 2025 AvTalk 9
AVT 326 Transcript
privatized Air India any favors by potentially withholding, or just sitting on information at this
point. It's bad for everyone.
[0:20:03] IP:  Yeah. I want to give them the benefit of the doubt.
[0:20:06] JR: They're making it real hard, though.
[0:20:07] IP: They are. They are. This particular instance is they're figuring out what to do and
they want to get it right. I want to give them the benefit of the doubt. But they need to speak up.
[0:20:20] JR: Yes.
[0:20:21] IP: And do something.
[0:20:22] JR: Yup. You know who should have less benefit of the doubt? I think it's us.
[0:20:29] IP: Why is it us, Jason?
[0:20:30] JR: I think we have a few things to correct.
[0:20:32] IP: We do need to atone for our errors. We gleefully atone for our errors. We regret
the errors, but we are happy to clear them up. One, the 787-8 does not have automatically
opening doors, gear doors. The 787-9 and Dash 10 do. this information comes to us from a
North American 787 captain. A little bit of background on why the doors open. I'm going to do
my best to summarize this, because they’re long and technical explanation, but it is super
interesting.
The flight director on the HUD that guides the optimal rotation rate for the pilot flying to follow is
called the TOGA reference line. It's designed to help the pilots maintain the right attitude in case
of an engine failure. If you pull back too much, you bleed off too much speed. If you don't pull
back soon enough, you could run out of runway before you're in the air. It guides the most
efficient rotation possible. When the gear doors open, that creates a significant amount of drag.
It actually dips the reference line a bit, so that the aircraft can climb out as efficient as possible.
© 2025 AvTalk 10
AVT 326 Transcript
On the Dash 9 and Dash 10, they removed the manual input of basically opening those doors
when the lever is selected. So, it opens them a second after the landing gear senses the weight
off, so that the drag characteristics doesn't change significantly, and that the handling
characteristics are smoother. It's not on the Dash 8. That is a Boeing thing, which I assume at
this point was because the Dash 8 came first and they went later on and said, “Oh, we could do
this.”
[0:22:28] JR: Well, I think we've talked about this before that the 788 is a very different aircraft
than the 789 and 10. This is just one of those many differences. Also, you hate the 788, so
there's that.
[0:22:41] IP: I do. I do. I don't like it, for a variety of reasons.
[0:22:45] JR: This being one of them. I don't know.
[0:22:46] IP: Yes. This being one of them.
[0:22:47] JR: Maybe. That'd be a real weird deep cut for you not to like this aircraft, but it’s
possible.
[0:22:53] IP: That's not the case in this particular regard. As for Jason's comments about the
APU last week, he was just wrong.
[0:23:01] JR: I was reading a thing that was wrong, or I read it wrong.
[0:23:03] IP: It’s just wrong.
[0:23:05] JR: The APU in fact is not on and running during takeoff. That is turned off before the
takeoff roll. In fact, the checklist says, make sure it's turned off. Yeah, not on. If there was a
double engine failure and the RAT would be devoid, it is not, because the APU is not working, or
it may have not been working. Who knows? It is, in fact, not supposed to be operating at that
phase of flight.
© 2025 AvTalk 11
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:23:29] IP: Finally, regarding the Ram Air Turbine.
[0:23:32] JR: Wait. There’s more?
[0:23:34] IP: Well, we got a couple of comments. I wanted to clarify something. This, I don't
think we got wrong, but I did want to clarify it, because I did get a couple of comments. I wanted
to make sure everyone that had listened last week understood what we were talking about. The
RAT comes out, it can come out for multiple reasons. Complete loss of engine power is one of
them. When there's not enough hydraulic pressure in the hydraulic systems, that's another.
When certain electric elements are not operating properly, and you can also deploy it manually.
I didn't want to make it sound like we were saying it was dual engine failure, and that's the only
thing that could have caused the RAT to drop. That is one of the possible scenarios in this
instance. Certainly, having some data from the flight data recorder would be helpful in this
regard.
[0:24:30] JR: Yeah. What of the two flight data recorders that they have both of?
[0:24:34] IP: What per chance happened here? We'll get there eventually, I hope.
[0:24:39] JR: I can't imagine we won't.
[0:24:41] IP: Those are the things that we wanted to correct and clarify. Thank you to everyone
who wrote in. Thank you, specifically to our wonderful Canadian plane person. You know who
you are, who helped us out with some great information there. The NTSB held its board meeting
yesterday, June 24th, to discuss the probable cause of the mid-cabin exit door plug blowout,
Alaska Airlines Flight 1282.
[0:25:11] JR: I can't believe we're still talking about this.
[0:25:13] IP: Well, these things take some time to –
© 2025 AvTalk 12
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:25:15] JR: They sure do.
[0:25:16] IP: - make their way through the system. We've known for a long time what happened.
The bolts that hold the door in place were not reinstalled after they were removed, because
areas near that exit door plug needed to be reworked. Rivets needed work. They needed to take
the door out. They didn't put the bolts back in. Door eventually popped out.
[0:25:37] JR: Mistakes were made.
[0:25:39] IP: Mistakes were made. But now we know a bit more of the how. The NTSB lists the
probable cause of this incident as, “Boeing's inadequate training, guidance, and oversight.”
That's something.
[0:25:58] JR: That's a lot of bad.
[0:26:00] IP: It's a lot of bad. They also said, that the Federal Aviation Administration was
ineffective in ensuring Boeing addressed “repetitive and systemic non-conformance issues
associated with its parts removal process.”
[0:26:12] JR: Basically, no one was doing any of the things they were supposed to do. Boeing's
training was inadequate. Their guidance was inadequate. Their oversight was inadequate. The
FAA's oversight of Boeing's oversight training and guidance was ineffective. Basically, no one
was doing their jobs, which is just not good.
[0:26:30] IP: It's almost worse than no one doing their jobs, because individual people were
doing their jobs overall.
[0:26:37] JR: Even if they didn't have the correct training to do that job. That's the bad part.
Let's skip right to that.
[0:26:46] IP: Yes. Give me the quote, Jason.
© 2025 AvTalk 13
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:26:47] JR: I guess, I will just quote Jon Ostrower’s Bluesky’s post in full here. “As part of its
investigation, NTSB found 23 members of the 24-member door team had not been directly
trained on how to open or close a 737 MAX mid-exit door plug at the time the Alaska 1282
aircraft was being built.” Number 24, you might think, 23 out of 24, that leaves you with one.
While the 24th person, they were out of the country, potentially, I guess, on vacation. The entirety
of the Boeing organization, the door team, there was one person who potentially had the
training to remove or replace the door plug, and that person simply was unavailable at the
moment. You had one of 23 other people, who is still not identified, probably will never be
identified, removing and replacing the door, despite them not actually having any training on
how to do that. Things were not good at Boeing at that point.
[0:27:52] IP: No. The NTSB has a list of 35 findings that include findings about the mid-exit door
plug specifically. The Boeing safety management system, Boeing's processes for installing and
removing these doors, the Federal Aviation Administration's oversight of Boeing's work, as well
as just generally approving of Boeing safety management system. But they also talk about
some of the other things that they found that aren't specifically related to the door plug itself, but
an incident on a flight could have been any flight, but this specific flight.
One of those things that they talk about is the crew being insufficiently trained in a realistic
scenario to use emergency equipment. This is the second time we're hearing about this this
year. There was a previous incident aboard a Swiss A330, in which it was a smoke and fumes
event onboard. The flight attendants had to use supplemental oxygen and fume hoods. They
didn't really know how to do that in an actual emergency setting. This equipment they had didn't
work for them. The equipment itself worked, but there were problems, and there were problems
in this fight as well, with removing the masks and safety equipment from its packaging. Where in
the Alaska flight, the cabin crew, they had to “improvise the tool to open the packaging.” The
NTSB is nice here and says, that suggests the standards, the design, or both do not adequately
consider ease of use in quick donning an emergency.
[0:29:44] JR: Yeah. The NTSB also praised the crew, and I quote here, “Point number seven of
the findings was the teamwork and complementary duties of the flight crew, which occurred
during the emergency, reinforced the necessity for a minimum crew of two pilots,” which I
thought was really quite interesting to put that jab in there. Probably, the FAA that like, hey,
© 2025 AvTalk 14
AVT 326 Transcript
teamwork was really effective here. This flight crew did almost everything exactly as they should
have. Hey, it turns out having two people up there on the flight deck is really helpful in situations
that you really can't predict like this. That there were some oddities. Like I said, the flight crew
did not perform the procedures to switch communications back to their headsets after removing
their oxygen masks, but it had no adverse effect on the subsequent safe landing of the airplane,
blah, blah, blah. But really found it interesting that they snuck that finding in there of like, hey,
having two people, definitely better than one in a situation like this.
[0:30:38] IP: Yeah. I caught that one as well and thought, oh, interesting, the NTSB, this is
where they're at right now. Now what? Obviously, Boeing is deep into a rework of its entire
corporate culture and enhancement of its safety practices. That remains ongoing. They are also
working on certification of a redesign of the actual door plug. That redesign will add two pieces
that prevent it from moving, “if they're installed correctly,” which makes it sound like, oh, well,
there's your opening for problems again. But the design will be such that if they're not installed
correctly, you can't install the side wall of the aircraft.
[0:31:36] JR: Or, you can install it poorly. There's that.
[0:31:38] IP: Then, hopefully, that'll be something that the QA catches. They're also going to put
lanyards that connect the bolts to the door plug, so that you can't remove the bolts. You can
take the bolts out of the thing to open the plug, but you can't just toss the bolts. They'll always
be connected to the door plug.
[0:32:01] JR: That's good.
[0:32:03] IP: There will be hammer-shaped secondary retention devices that will be installed,
that need to be rotated into position to complete the installation of the plug. There's multiple
pieces of hardware now that will ensure that the plug is where it's supposed to be.
[0:32:18] JR: In response to the NTSB board meeting, the FAA issued a statement as it often
does. Not particularly long, but that's okay. It said, “The FAA takes NTSB recommendation
seriously and will carefully evaluate those issues. Today, the FAA has fundamentally changed
how it oversees Boeing, since the Alaska Airlines door plug accident, and we will continue this
© 2025 AvTalk 15
AVT 326 Transcript
aggressive oversight to ensure Boeing fixes its systemic production quality issues. We are
actively monitoring Boeing's performance and meet weekly with the company to review its
progress and any challenges it's facing in implementing necessary changes. We have a full
complement of safety inspectors in Boeing's facilities and they are conducting more targeted
audits and inspections. While Boeing is making progress, we will not lift the 737 monthly
production cap until we are confident the company can maintain safety and quality, while
making more aircraft.”
I guess, that's all you’d expect the FAA to say. Still have absolutely no idea when they'll lift that
cap to allow Boeing to make more 737s. But at this rate, I'm not confident they'd be able to do it
anyway with the supply chain. I guess, everything is fine.
[0:33:25] IP: Sure. Fine seems –
[0:33:29] JR: Fine?
[0:33:31] IP: Fine seems fine. Let's stick with the 737 MAX, but switch over to earlier accidents,
because lawyers for the relatives of 737 MAX crash victims have filed with the US federal judge
overseeing the case between Boeing and the Department of Justice to reject the non-
prosecution agreement that Boeing and the DOJ recently reached. Judge Reed O'Connor now
has before him requests from the relatives that he not allow the non-prosecution agreement to
go forward, reject that agreement, and appoint a special prosecutor to carry on the case,
because they say the Department of Justice is conflicted and they believe that the DOJ has an
interest in not seeing the case through.
The lawyers say, “This would be necessary to, “reflect the fact that Boeing criminally caused the
deaths of the crash victims,” and that the compensation payments that are part of the non-
prosecution agreement are, “designed to persuade families to support a deal letting Boeing
essentially buy its way out of a criminal conviction.””
They're also concerned that because Boeing and the DOJ have already signed the non-
prosecution agreement that the DOJ could possibly be prohibited by the agreement of pursuing
the case even if the judge rejects the motion to dismiss. They're saying the special prosecutor is
© 2025 AvTalk 16
AVT 326 Transcript
necessary, because even if the judge rejected this non-prosecution agreement, the DOJ couldn't
move forward anyway. I'm not really sure what would happen in that case if they didn't and get a
special prosecutor.
The attorneys are also – this is the attorneys for the victim's families as well. They're asking the
judge to declare parts of the non-prosecution agreement void, appoint a special prosecutor and
then, see this through to trial. It'll be very interesting to see where this heads next. Because if
we go all the way back to the beginning, there was a deferred prosecution agreement that was
reached. Then, in part, because of the Alaska incident, the DOJ said, “Okay. Now you violated
the deferred prosecution agreement. We are going to prosecute you.” Then the administration
changed from the Biden administration to the Trump administration. Trump's DOJ said, “We're
going to not move forward with this. We've reached a non-prosecution agreement.” Boeing is
eager to sign that. Now we are where we are. It'll be interesting to see what happens next. I'm
not sure where this goes, or when it goes. I'm not sure if there are any deadlines for filing, or
responses, but I guess, it's up to Judge O'Connor at this point.
[0:36:31] JR: The story just keeps on going.
[0:36:33] IP: It does, indeed. Let's stick with the law for a moment, because we're going to
Russia, Jason.
[0:36:40] JR: Oh, can we not?
[0:36:42] IP: Well, we're going to London to talk about Russia.
[0:36:44] JR: Oh. Well, that's much better. I already booked a flight to London once.
[0:36:47] IP: Excellent. This goes back to Russian Airlines keeping leased aircraft, following the
invasion of Ukraine, where lessors outside of Russia said, “Hey, we want our planes back.”
Russian Airlines said, “No, we're just going to keep them.” We have Irish lessor AerCap and
other aircraft leasing entities saying, “Well, we need our money back. If we can't get the planes
back, we need our money.” They filed insurance claims. They used all risk claims and war risk
claims, because they're stolen planes and they were stolen because of a war. The insurers said,
© 2025 AvTalk 17
AVT 326 Transcript
“Well, the planes are still there, so we don't have to pay you. Because they weren't destroyed.
They weren't destroyed. They're just not yours anymore. You're not able to –”
[0:37:47] JR: I have a feeling that the courts may have taken another stance on that situation.
[0:37:52] IP: It finally worked its way through the court. The insurance companies argued, the
planes are still there and there's a possibility that you could get them back. The lessors said,
“Even if we could get them back at this point, they're no good to us.”
[0:38:06] JR: They're unusable. Whatever is in Russia now is no longer usable. Even if it is
technically usable, it is, what would you call that? Usable but not usable, just they're
Schrödinger's airplanes. They both exist, but they don’t exist.
[0:38:18] IP: Schrödinger's airplanes. There you go. The judge in the London Superior Court
has said, “Yes, insurance companies, you owe these lessors money.” There's about 1.1 billion
dollars at stake here. The big question now is when are these lessors going to get paid? That's
still the uncertain part. I'm sure there's a lot of negotiation still to come about how much they're
actually going to get paid and when they're going to get paid. The judge has said, “No, you owe
them the money.”
[0:38:55] JR: All right. That's good. That seems sane and reasonable. It took a long time to get
in there.
[0:39:00] IP: What will happen next? Sane and reasonable. What will happen next?
[0:39:03] JR: I don't know.
[0:39:03] IP: Speaking of sane and reasonable –
[0:39:06] JR: Wow. What a transition.
[0:39:06] IP: Or not, as the case may be. Canada's competition regulator has said, “No, we
should let foreign companies own 100% of airlines in Canada.”
© 2025 AvTalk 18
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:39:18] JR: This is the Canada that lives north of the US, that same Canada, the same
Canada that's been so protectionist that like –
[0:39:25] IP: Same Canada.
[0:39:26] JR: – that foreign carriers can only operate a couple of times a week. Didn't Qatar
Airways only recently get into Toronto? Canada has been super protectionist.
[0:39:37] IP: Over to 2018, foreign entities could only own up to 25% of a Canadian airline. In
2018, that changed to up to 49%. No foreign entity can own a majority of a Canadian airline.
Canada's competition bureau is now saying, “Hey, why not let them own 100%?”
[0:40:00] JR: Is that a good idea?
[0:40:03] IP: It seems on the face of things to be an interesting idea to increase competition.
Because what that would allow is other companies, other airlines to come in and offer flights
and lower fares. That said, historically, allowing this has not worked for both the country that is
allowing it, and especially the foreign airlines that are doing it.
[0:40:37] JR: This doesn't pass the sniff test, and I'm real interested to know why now, why it's
just happening now?
[0:40:42] IP: I think this had just been working its way through as a study. It'll be interesting to
see what happens, given, I mean, there have been certainly changes. I mean, we've gone from
25% to 49% within the last 10 years. I'm not sure where this goes. Historically speaking, you
had Air Canada and another airline. That was it.
[0:41:04] JR: Yup. Still the case, depending on your region.
[0:41:07] IP: Right. But now you have Porter finding its legs a bit. They just announced a bunch
of new –
© 2025 AvTalk 19
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:41:15] JR: New non-US routes.
[0:41:17] IP: Exactly. Headed to a bunch of warm places. You've got Flair that's still there.
[0:41:23] JR: Don't forget WestJet. But that, I guess, is the other. Yeah.
[0:41:27] IP: WestJet was the other airline. Sorry, if I wasn't clear on that one. What ends up
happening when countries allow this foreign ownership is you get a bunch of airlines, or a few
airlines coming in right away offering a couple of flights, not really knowing how to make it work
with their own networks and then leaving. I get the idea behind this, but it just never really works
in practice.
[0:41:55] JR: We'll keep an eye on it. Not closely, but an eye.
[0:41:59] IP: If anything comes of it, we'll see. If they change the law, then we can start looking
at it. Let's talk about other things that never really work in practice. That's WOW 2.0 is ever so
closer to not existing anymore. The CEO and Vice Chairman of PLAY, which is, I guess,
technically still based in Iceland, is trying to leave Iceland entirely.
[0:42:27] JR: They're moving to the Maltese neighborhood.
[0:42:29] IP: Exactly. They're trying to close up stakes and shift everything over to their multi-
operation, their multi-AOC. They would get rid of the Icelandic AOC and become PLAY Europe.
[0:42:43] JR: Okay.
[0:42:44] IP: Gone is the transatlantic flying.
[0:42:46] JR: I'm still surprised they're still around. Okay, if this is what they got to do.
[0:42:51] IP: Yeah, exactly. They want to be done with this by the end of summer. Pretty
aggressive timeline. But something that, I think, is best for everyone, if it keeps them flying.
© 2025 AvTalk 20
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:43:01] JR: Okay. I have nothing to add.
[0:43:03] IP: All right.
[0:43:03] JR: Go for it. Sure.
[0:43:05] IP: Let's end the show with, there are some airlines that can't be killed. Alitalia, as
we've talked about recently, is one of them, but not too far away is Air Europa. By all accounts,
Air Europa should not exist anymore.
[0:43:22] JR: No. But COVID happened and now it still does. Then some other stuff along the
way, but I think that was the main thing keeping Air Europa.
[0:43:30] IP: Every time somebody tries to buy them, because somebody will eventually buy
them, it doesn't work out. IAG tried to buy them. I think Air France KLM looked at it. Lufthansa
Group had some ideas. Everyone has just said, “Okay, let's just figure out where to put them.”
[0:43:47] JR: Maybe we'll see an Uno reverse card plate here, and Air Canada will buy Turkish.
No, I meant Air Europa. Oh, I gave it away. I read the wrong thing.
[0:43:56] IP: That’s all right.
[0:43:58] JR: I gave it all away. Okay. Well, Turkish.
[0:44:00] IP: Turkish Airlines has said that it is in discussions with Air Europa for an investment
opportunity. It doesn't look like they're going to purchase Air Europa, at least at this point. But
they're looking to invest in the airline, which interesting here is that Turkish is one of the largest
carriers in Star Alliance. Air Europa is currently, for the moment, still in SkyTeam, and that would
leave them at cross purposes, depending on what type of investment this would be. We'll see
what happens and see if they actually do anything there. Or if this is just another airline tossing
its hat in the ring.
© 2025 AvTalk 21
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:44:46] JR: I didn't see that coming. Turkish isn't exactly known for gobbling up other
European airlines at all. That's Lufthansa's thing.
[0:44:54] IP: Yeah, exactly. This is one to watch, to see –
[0:44:57] JR: I don't know how I feel about this.
[0:44:58] IP: – entirely sure what's going on here, but interesting nonetheless. I said we were
going to close the show, but talking about SkyTeam reminded me that we can wish SkyTeam a
happy 25th anniversary.
[0:45:08] JR: Hey.
[0:45:10] IP: SkyTeam is 25 years old. They celebrated their 25th anniversary over the
weekend. Congratulations, SkyTeam and all your SkyTeam Alliance airlines.
[0:45:19] JR: Yes. They've still got all their founding airlines, right?
[0:45:22] IP: I think so.
[0:45:24] JR: Maybe.
[0:45:25] IP: I think so.
[0:45:26] JR: Yeah. Delta, Aeromexico, Air France, and Korean. I think they're all still there.
That's nice.
[0:45:32] IP: And they've added a couple fairly recently. But maybe they'll lose Air Europa at
some point in the future.
[0:45:39] JR: And Aeroflot, but they've added SAS, which is nice.
© 2025 AvTalk 22
AVT 326 Transcript
[0:45:43] IP: There you go. Well, on that note, we're going to call this good enough for episode
326 of AvTalk.
[0:45:50] JR: Just barely.
[0:45:51] IP: Just barely. I am Ian Petchenik, here, as always with –
[0:45:57] JR: Jason Rabinowitz. Thanks for listening.
[END]
© 2025 AvTalk 23