Day: February 7, 2024

An attorney representing a group of passengers on Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 that suffered a depressurization after a door plug panel blew off a Boeing 737 Max 9 midflight has expanded the lawsuit with new allegations about the incident.

Mark Lindquist, an attorney representing 22 passengers who were on Flight 1282 when the emergency occurred in a lawsuit against Alaska Airlines and Boeing, said the newly amended lawsuit includes a new allegation that passengers on a prior flight of the aircraft heard a whistling sound.

The updated lawsuit says “there was a whistling sound coming from the vicinity of the door plug on a previous flight of the subject plane. Passengers apparently noticed the whistling sound and brought it to the attention of flight attendants who reportedly informed the pilot or first officer.”

It alleges that no known further action was taken “After the pilot checked cockpit instruments, which purportedly read normal.”

NTSB REPORT: MISSING BOLTS FROM DOOR PLUG PLAYED FACTOR IN MIDAIR BLOWOUT OF ALASKA AIRLINES FLIGHT

The expanded lawsuit also cites the preliminary report released by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) on Tuesday, which found the cockpit door was designed to blow out in a depressurization situation and that pilots and crew weren’t informed of this design feature.

“The resulting shock, noise, and communication difficulties contributed to a lack of proper communication between the flight crew and passengers, thereby intensifying confusion and stress,” according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit includes allegations of emotional and physical injuries, including severe stress, anxiety, trauma and hearing damage. More passengers were added to the lawsuit in the amended filing.

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Alaska Airlines and Boeing declined to comment on the pending litigation. 

The door plug blowout and depressurization incident occurred on Jan. 5, when Flight 1282 was climbing after takeoff from Oregon’s Portland International Airport en route to Ontario, California. At about 16,000 feet, the door plug panel – which covers an emergency exit that’s deactivated on planes with lower passenger capacity layouts – blew out, causing the cabin to depressurize.

Some passengers’ items were blown out of the airliner due to the depressurization and empty seats near the hole in the fuselage sustained damage. The plane safely returned to Portland for an emergency landing and no serious injuries were reported.

BOEING CEO SAYS COMPANY HAS ‘MUCH TO PROVE’

After the incident, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) grounded 737 Max 9s for further inspections that the regulator carried out with the two U.S. carriers that operate the variant, Alaska and United Airlines.

In late January, Boeing and the FAA finalized inspection protocols that had to be completed prior to the planes returning to service.

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The FAA said Monday that 78 of 79 United Alaska Airlines Max 9 planes have been inspected and returned to service. At that time, 57 of 65 Alaska Airlines Max 9 planes had been returned to service, though the airline indicated that inspections were expected to be completed on all of its Max 9 planes – except for the one involved in the emergency – by Tuesday.

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Walt Disney handily beat Wall Street’s earnings expectations on Wednesday, lifted by record results at its theme parks and continued cost-cutting efforts, as it announced an investment in Fortnite-maker Epic Games.

Even before the company’s investor call, CEO Bob Iger announced in a CNBC interview that the company would take a $1.5 billion stake in Epic and work with the company to create a “huge Disney universe.”

“This marks Disney’s biggest entry ever into the world of games and offers significant opportunities for growth and expansion,” Iger said in a statement.

Disney described an online world in which consumers will be able to play, watch, shop and engage with characters and stories from Disney, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars and Avatar.

DISNEY CEO BOB IGER GETS MORE ACTIVIST INVESTOR HEAT AMID STOCK SLUMP

The announcement signals another attempt at interactive entertainment for Disney, which in 2016 shut down its Disney Interactive Studios, publisher of the toys-come-to-life game series “Infinity,” and announced it would instead license its characters to outside game companies.

Shares of Disney were up 7% in after-hours trading.

Disney’s board of directors also authorized a $3 billion share repurchase program for the current fiscal year, and declared a dividend of 45 cents a share, payable on July 25 to shareholders of record on July 8. That represents a 50% increase from the dividend paid in January.

The company posted earnings of $1.22 per share, excluding certain items, ahead of analysts’ consensus forecast of 99 cents per share for October through December.

Quarterly revenue was comparable to a year ago, at $23.5 billion, but short of projections of $23.6 billion.

Disney said it cut $500 million in costs across its business during the quarter, and that it remains on track to meet or exceed $7.5 billion in savings by the end of the current fiscal year.

The company is under pressure from activist investor Nelson Peltz, who is seeking Netflix-like profit for its streaming business, better performance of its movies at the box office, and more details about its plans to make ESPN a dominant digital platform.

“Just one year ago, we outlined an ambitious plan to return the Walt Disney Company to a period of sustained growth and shareholder value creation,” Iger said in a statement. “Our strong performance this past quarter demonstrates we have turned the corner and entered a new era of growth for our company.”

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The company’s Experiences unit, which includes its theme parks and consumer products, posted record revenue, operating income and operating margins.

Disney reaffirmed guidance that its streaming business would reach profitability by September. It reduced streaming operating losses to $138 million in the quarter, a dramatic improvement over a year ago, when it lost nearly $1 billion. The average monthly revenue per Disney+ user, outside of India, rose 14 cents.

The Disney+ streaming service shed 1.3 million subscribers, nearly double the loss of 700,000 that analysts forecast, after an October price increase.

The company forecast it would gain 5.5 million to 6 million Disney+ subscribers in its second quarter, with positive momentum in per-user revenue.

The Entertainment unit’s streaming business, which also includes Hulu and Disney+ Hotstar in India, reported revenue of $5.5 billion, just above forecasts, and marking a 15% improvement from a year ago.

Overall revenue for the Entertainment segment, which encompasses Disney’s traditional TV business, streaming and film, dropped 7% from a year earlier to $9.98 billion.

The results were dragged down by lower ad revenue at ABC and lower fees from the continued losses of cable subscribers, partially offset by reduced programming costs associated with the Hollywood strikes. The weak box office performance of “The Marvels” and “Wish,” compared with the strong results a year ago from “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” and “Avatar: The Way of Water,” dragged content sales and licensing to a loss.

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Disney’s sports division, which includes ESPN, the ESPN+ streaming service and Star in India, reported revenue of $4.8 billion, a gain of 4% from a year ago, but an operating loss of $103 million attributable to a deepening loss at Star in India.

Theme park results were buoyed by the opening of the World of Frozen attraction at Hong Kong Disneyland and Zootopia at Shanghai Disney Resort. Higher attendance at those parks helped offset a drop at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida. The unit reported revenue of $9.1 billion and operating income of $3.1 billion.

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