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After flying from Davos to Zurich on helicopters and boarding the modified Boeing Co. 737, Blinken and his party were informed that the aircraft had been deemed unsafe to fly. An oxygen leak detected previously could not be remedied.

"Maintenance" is a bit of a euphemism.




There's an oxygen storage system that serves the cockpit for emergencies (pax masks are served by chemical oxygen generators, not tanks). If the cockpit system has a leak, it's possible that the crew would not be able to be supplied oxygen in a depressurization or smoke in cockpit scenario, so there's a preflight check that all is working. If the plane failed this check, that's consistent with it being discovered after pax are boarded.

It's quite similar to fixing a leak and recharging the AC on your car. If you'd call that maintenance, you should call this maintenance.

One of the primary reasons that aviation is so safe is experiences like this. Aircraft fails a preflight check for something and is AOG until fixed. ("Aircraft On Ground", aka "broken".) There's an entire industry around serving maintenance needs and special handling for AOG situations.


Uh no, that's exactly the proper term.


> Uh no, that's exactly the proper term.

I thought that maintenance meant to regularly change your engine oil in order for the engine to not become clogged. But hey, English is not my mother tongue. /s




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