The fuselage break suffered by a Southwest Airlines 737 jet last week has prompted Australian flag carrier Quantas to perform checks on four of its older 737 airplanes.
However, the airline said that reports claiming it will ground the four older planes are untrue. It said that checks will be carried out within the next 10 days.
The fuselage of a Southwest Airlines 737-300 jet from Phoenix, Arizona tore and made a gash of about 5 feet last week, reports say, prompting the plane to make an emergency landing at a military base about 250 kilometers from where it took off.
The incident has also pushed the Federal Aviation Administration in the US to issue a world-wide directive to inspect similar aircrafts.
According to reports, the directive affects 175 Boeing 737-300, 400 and 500 airplanes owned by various firms worldwide.
Qantas spokeswoman Emma Kearns said in a statement that Quantas does not “have to ground them, we just have to carry out inspections on four of the fleet in line with the airline worthiness directive by the FAA.”
