By BOB CHRISTIE
Associated Press
PHOENIX – The crown prince of Thailand has one. So do the presidents of Peru and Chile. The Chinese Air Force relies on it, as do airlines in Russia, Indonesia, Australia and Romania.
The Boeing 737 is a workhorse of international aviation. And the accident in which the roof of a Southwest Airlines jet ripped open 34,000 feet over Arizona has brought scrutiny to the hundreds of older-model 737s around the world that could be similarly vulnerable because of tiny, hard-to-find stress fractures in the aluminum skin.
The planes will now be subjected to repeated examinations as the problem revealed by the fuselage crack on the Southwest flight resonates through the world’s 737 fleet for years to come.