United Airlines is losing money due to the grounding of Boeing planes

A major US airline said it expects to lose money in the three months between January and March due to the grounding of its Boeing 737 MAX 9 aircraft.

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) grounded 171 planes after an unused door broke mid-flight.

United Airlines has 79 aircraft in its fleet, more than any other airline, followed by Alaska Airlines.

The two airlines were forced to cancel hundreds of flights this month due to inspections.

united He said It expects the planes to remain grounded until January 26, and its forecasts assume that it will not be able to fly them at all this month.

An Alaska Airlines flight from Portland, Oregon, to Ontario, California, reached an altitude of 16,000 feet (4,876 meters) when it began its emergency descent, according to flight tracking data, after an unused emergency exit door exploded.

“The safety of the flying public, not speed, will determine the timetable for these aircraft’s return to service,” the agency said in a statement on Sunday.

The 737-900ER has achieved 11 million hours of incident-free operations comparable to the newer 737 MAX 9 aircraft.

The FAA did not mandate that the older model be grounded while operators performed visual inspections.

Boeing said it will increase the quality of inspections in manufacturing operations following the accident.

On Tuesday, United announced flat pre-tax profits of $3.4bn (£2.67bn) for the whole of 2023.

United will discuss the results on a call with analysts and investors Tuesday morning where the company is expected to provide an update on safety inspections of the grounded planes.

Both Alaska and Boeing are scheduled to announce their results in the next two weeks.