US investigators have recovered a part of the fuselage that blew out of an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 Max 9 jet from the backyard of a school teacher in Portland, Oregon.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), which is investigating the incident, said that the part of the fuselage had been located on Sunday by a school teacher named Bob.
He reportedly sent the agency two photos of the wreckage in his backyard.
The federal agency had requested people to keep an eye out for the door plug in the Cedar Hills region, west of Portland.
Earlier on Sunday, a group of local residents searched through a stretch of land full of dense thickets, situated between bustling roads and a light rail train station.
According to the Associated Press, a searcher identified as Adam Pirkle said he had ridden 22km, manoeuvring his bicycle through the overgrowth.
“I’ve been looking at the flight track, I was looking at the winds,” he said. “I’ve been trying to focus on wooded areas.”
NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy told reporters on Sunday: “I’m excited to announce that we found the door plug.”
She thanked the school teacher, identified by his first name only. “Thank you, Bob.
“We’re going to go pick that up and make sure that we begin analysing it,” Ms Homendy said.
Two cell phones have also been found, one in a yard and another on the side of the road, she added.
It was also reported that Alaska Airlines pilots experienced pressurisation warning lights on three prior flights of a two-month-old Boeing 737 MAX 9 jet before it made an emergency landing due to a torn door plug.
Ms Homendy mentioned on Sunday night that the auto pressurisation fail light had activated on 7 December, 3 January, and 4 January. However, she stated that it remained unclear whether there was any connection between those incidents and the rapid depressurisation incident.
On Saturday, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued a directive to temporarily ground 171 Boeing MAX 9 jets equipped with the same panel after the Alaskan Airlines plane had to make an emergency landing due to a gap in the fuselage.
“They heard a bang,” Ms Homendy told reporters on Sunday, of the flight deck crew.
“Communication was a serious issue... It was described as chaos,” she added.
“It must have been a terrifying event to experience,” Ms Homendy said.
After takeoff from Portland, Oregon, en route to Ontario, California, the door plug on the left side of an Alaska Airlines jet tore off. This incident compelled the pilots to turn back and execute a safe landing, ensuring the well-being of all 171 passengers and six crew members on board.
NTSB also said that the cockpit voice recorder from the Boeing 737 MAX 9 jet was overwritten by the time it was recovered.
Ms Homendy said that there was no data available on the cockpit voice recorder after it was sent to NTSB labs because it was not retrieved by the two-hour mark, when recording restarts and previous data is erased.
“It’s a very chaotic event. The circuit breaker for the CVR (cockpit voice recorder) was not pulled. The maintenance team went out to get it, but it was right at about the two-hour mark,” she added.
“If that communication is not recorded, that is unfortunately a loss for us and a loss for the FAA and a loss for safety because that information is key not just for our investigation but for improving aviation safety,” she said.
Additional reporting with agencies
