Some Passengers Avoid Taking Flights on DC-10s
A number of airline passengers are asking not to be booked on flights using DC-10 jetliners after two explosive engine failures within a month on the jumbo jet, several agents and carriers said Friday.
Since the July 19 crash of a United Airlines DC-10 in Sioux City, Iowa, that killed 111 people, about 400 customers have asked not to be booked on DC-10s, said Rob Doughty, a spokesman for United at its Chicago headquarters. Doughty said United carries a total of about 150,000 passengers daily.
The McDonnell Douglas-built aircraft is used by about 50 airlines around the world.
There have been several other incidents involving DC-10s since the Sioux City crash, which followed an explosive engine failure.
In one of the latest incidents, a Northwest Airlines DC-10 made a safe emergency landing Thursday in Denver after an “uncontained engine failure” in which flying parts punched holes in the housing of the airliner’s tail-mounted engine.
Northwest has worked with about 25 customers who have expressed concern about the aircraft, said Bob Gibbons, a Northwest spokesman in Eagan, Minn. As a matter of policy, Northwest will not allow changes of aircraft on discount tickets where any changes normally are prohibited, Gibbons said.
At United, nearly all fliers expressing aircraft preferences are accommodated, unless the only choice on a particular route is the DC-10, Doughty said. Even requests by passengers with discount-fare tickets--which usually prohibit changes in flight plans--are being granted, he said.
Nearly all the worried customers are vacationers and other leisure passengers, as opposed to seasoned business travelers, both airlines and agents say.
Michael Edelman, an agent at JB’s World Travel in Manhattan, reported about a quarter of the agency’s customers are requesting non-DC-10 flights.
Other travel agents, like William Cooper in Pompano Beach, Fla., say they are seeing more apprehension about air safety in general, not limited to specific types of aircraft.
That concern has been heightened by other recent incidents involving aging aircraft.
