Originally Posted by
Justin026
One parallel being discussed here is the use by Northwest of DC-9 aircraft for very long service lives. A dwindling number of these planes came to DL with the merger and are still in service.
The idea that NWA passively followed government or manufacturer recommendations on this group of planes isn't correct. The decisions to extend these planes' lives was made at the corporate level and was managed as a major in-house program. The Atlanta NWA maintenance facility (ex-Southern, ex-Republic) employed over one thousand mechanics for years in the complete refitting and rebuilding of each plane in this program.
This is a far cry from what is happening with SWA and this incident.
It is different. Northwest made the decision that it could extend the life of the DC-9s (many of which were rebuilt across the runway here at Love Field by the now defunct DalFort Aerospace) in lieu of buying newer aircraft. The equivalent to that would have been Southwest rebuilding our original 737-200s (both from the same timeperiod) and avoiding buying brand new 737-300s or the even newer -700s. We are phasing out the -300s and as we take delivery of a -700, we retire a -300.