Air France Flight 447

How much of the welders time went to build and modify things at the whim of the Rig Manager and Chief Mechanic?

It has to be astoundingly good, or else planes will start falling out of the sky. The recent SWA incident could have easily been much worse.

X-ray and other NDT techniques are industry standard for aircraft maintenance. Itā€™s 2018, there isnā€™t anything new or unusual about it.

Yeah the author got a bit melodramatic, so what, heā€™s still got a point.

Happens every day at St. Maarten. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlTNj6IWey4

Yes it reminded me of that.
I have been there a few times.

actually very little as it was a series of rigs and mods had to be approved in the office and then applied to all.

So you mean to tell me that things have changed from the good olā€™ days when the Toolpusher was God and redesigned the rig to his fansy, only for the other Toolpusher to change it all on his hitch??

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I used to keep busy in my Class days on annual surveys, just looking for ā€œmodificationsā€ that were detrimental to the structural well being of the Unit. . . .

No, but the implied demand that a truly safety driven organization would NDT every blade and disk before every flight or some other short interval is absurd.

At some point the very act of inspection imposes a threat to material and process reliability. The old adage of ā€œinspect it until itā€™s brokeā€ did not magicallly arise from someoneā€™s imagination.

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The part that concerns me isnā€™t the blade, itā€™s the containment failure. Thatā€™s not supposed to happen, ever.

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