The US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has urged the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and Boeing to act, after the agency identified evacuation slide deployment failures on a 757 aircraft during an emergency landing.
The NTSB said that this issue was discovered during the investigation of FedEx flight 1376, after it made an emergency landing in Tennessee in October 2023.
Upon landing, the flight crew attempted to evacuate the plane via the left (L1) door, but it failed to open completely, and an emergency slide did not deploy. The right (R1) door was also jammed due to a faulty latch but was eventually forced open.
This new report found that the FedEx aircraft that was involved in this 2023 incident should have been installed with the correct bannis latches, a critical component in of the evacuation slide system.
The agency stated that Boeing aircraft maintenance manuals and illustrated parts catalogues contained “inconsistent and conflicting” depictions of the required latch configurations, adding that this could have contributed to improper installations and failures.
Inspections carried out in the wake of this incident of 97 other FedEx 757 aircraft found that 46 doors (24%) had “noncompliant evacuation slide components” that did not meet FAA airworthiness directives.
The agency added that it is currently unknown why noncompliant aircraft components were present at the time of the accident.
Upon further inspections, the NTSB also found similar issues in 727 and 737 aircraft that use the same latch mechanism.
The report concluded that all 757 operators inspect the bannis latches on the doors of 757-200, -200CB, and -300 series aircraft and, if necessary, modify or replace them to ensure compliance with safety regulations.