China Eastern refuted online rumors that the crashed passenger plane was related to fork repairs.
On March 24, Liu Xiaodong, Director of the Propaganda Department of China Eastern Airlines, introduced at the press conference that the rumors about the hidden danger of the component commonly known as the fork and the crashed plane were untrue. The aircraft B1791 in the accident was only 6.8 years old and flew 8,986 sorties in total. It did not meet the most stringent maintenance standard for the “shift fork” component in the airworthiness directive standard of the aircraft type – 22,600 flight take-offs and landings. This component was not involved in the crashed aircraft. Fix the problem.”
The so-called pickle fork refers to the connecting parts of the aircraft fuselage and wings. In December 2019, there was a public report that China Eastern Technology successfully completed the deep repair of the fork of the B737NG aircraft independently. After the air crash, some netizens linked the repair work to the accident and speculated that it might be related to the accident.
Liu Xiaodong said at the press conference that the only authoritative information channel for investigating the cause of the accident is the accident investigation team, and China Eastern is actively cooperating with the investigation. Second, the crashed aircraft did not involve repairs to this component. In October 2019, according to the safety reminder of the Federal Aviation Administration of the United States, Boeing conducted an emergency inspection on a connecting part of the fuselage and wing of the 737NG aircraft around the world, which is commonly known as the “pickle fork”. There are 1,000 registered passenger aircraft with serial numbers, of which China Eastern Airlines Yunnan Co., Ltd. has one aircraft. China Eastern Technology Yunnan Branch has carried out professional maintenance under the cooperation and authorization of Boeing, and fully meets the airworthiness requirements of civil aviation. aircraft were withdrawn from the fleet on September 8, 2020.
Liu Xiaodong said that regarding maintenance costs, even though the number of flights was reduced during the epidemic, in order to ensure safety, China Eastern Airlines did not reduce maintenance costs, but increased them. “Maintenance costs in 2021 will increase by 12% compared to 2019. As a listed company, China Eastern has open and well-documented data, and we are also concerned that the relevant media have withdrawn inaccurate reports.”