Airworthiness Directives; The Boeing Company Airplanes

<RULE> DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION <SUBAGY>Federal Aviation Administration</SUBAGY> <CFR>14 CFR Part 39</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Docket No. FAA-2025-0481; Project Identifier AD-2024-00614-T; Amendment 39-23212; AD 2025-25-04]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 2120-AA64</RIN> <SUBJECT>Airworthiness Directives; The Boeing Company Airplanes</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), DOT. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The FAA is superseding Airworthiness Directive (AD) 2023-09-04, which applied to certain The Boeing Company Model 737-600, -700, -700C, -800, -900, and -900ER series airplanes, and certain Model 737-8 and -9 airplanes. AD 2023-09-04 required inspecting all escape slide assemblies to identify affected parts and replacing affected escape slide assemblies with different assemblies. This AD was prompted by the determination that additional airplanes might be affected by the unsafe condition. This AD retains the requirements of AD 2023-09-04 and requires those actions for additional airplanes, including Model 737-8200 airplanes. The FAA is issuing this AD to address the unsafe condition on these products. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> This AD is effective January 16, 2026. The Director of the Federal Register approved the incorporation by reference of a certain publication listed in this AD as of January 16, 2026. The Director of the Federal Register approved the incorporation by reference of certain other publications listed in this AD as of June 29, 2023 (88 FR 33817, May 25, 2023). </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> <E T="03">AD Docket:</E> You may examine the AD docket at <E T="03">regulations.gov</E> under Docket No. FAA-2025-0481; or in person at Docket Operations between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, except Federal holidays. The AD docket contains this final rule, any comments received, and other information. The address for Docket Operations is U.S. Department of Transportation, Docket Operations, M-30, West Building Ground Floor, Room W12-140, 1200 New Jersey Avenue SE, Washington, DC 20590. <E T="03">Material Incorporated by Reference:</E> • For Boeing material identified in this AD, contact Boeing Commercial Airplanes, Attention: Contractual & Data Services (C&DS), 2600 Westminster Blvd., MC 110-SK57, Seal Beach, CA 90740-5600; telephone 562-797-1717; website <E T="03">myboeingfleet.com.</E> • You may view this material at the FAA, Airworthiness Products Section, Operational Safety Branch, 2200 South 216th St., Des Moines, WA. For information on the availability of this material at the FAA, call 206-231-3195. It is also available at <E T="03">regulations.gov</E> under Docket No. FAA-2025-0481. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Katherine Venegas, Aviation Safety Engineer, FAA, 2200 South 216th St., Des Moines, WA 98198; phone: 562-627-5353; email: <E T="03">katherine.venegas@faa.gov.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Background</HD> The FAA issued a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) to amend 14 CFR part 39 to supersede AD 2023-09-04, Amendment 39-22427 (88 FR 33817, May 25, 2023) (AD 2023-09-04). AD 2023-09-04 applied to certain The Boeing Company Model 737-600, -700, -700C, -800, -900, and -900ER series airplanes, and certain Model 737-8 and -9 airplanes. The NPRM was published in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> on April 10, 2025 (90 FR 15321). The NPRM was prompted by the determination that additional airplanes might be affected by the unsafe condition. In the NPRM, the FAA proposed to continue to require the actions in AD 2023-09-04 and requires those actions for additional airplanes, including Model 737-8200 airplanes. The FAA is issuing this AD to address inflation of the escape slide while it is in the escape slide compartment, which could result in injury to passengers and crew during normal operation, or impede an emergency evacuation by rendering the exit unusable. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Discussion of Final Airworthiness Directive</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Comments</HD> The FAA received comments from the Air Line Pilots Association, International (ALPA), Aviation Partners Boeing (APB), Boeing, ProTech Aero Services Limited (ProTech), and United Airlines who supported the NPRM without change. The FAA received an additional comment from the Turkish Airlines. The following presents the comment received on the NPRM and the FAA's response to the comment. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Request To Revise the Credit for Previous Actions Paragraph</HD> Turkish Airlines requested that the FAA revise paragraph (j)(1) of the proposed AD to provide credit for the actions specified in paragraph (g) of the proposed AD if those actions were performed before the effective date of the proposed AD, using Boeing Special Attention Requirements Bulletin 737-25-1855 RB, dated August 31, 2021; or Boeing Special Attention Requirements Bulletin 737-25-1866 RB, dated September 27, 2021; as applicable. In the NPRM, the FAA proposed to provide credit only if those actions were performed before June 29, 2023 (the effective date of AD 2023-09-04). The commenter stated that paragraph (j)(1) of the proposed AD does not cover actions performed between June 29, 2023, and the effective date of the proposed AD. The FAA disagrees with the request. Paragraphs (g) and (j)(1) of this AD retain the requirements of paragraphs (g) and (i), respectively, of AD 2023-09-04 with no changes. Accordingly, paragraph (j)(1) of this AD provides credit for the requirements of paragraph (g) of this AD using the original issue of the applicable requirements bulletin, only if performed before June 29, 2023. After June 29, 2023, the requirements of paragraph (g) must be accomplished using Revision 1 of the applicable requirements bulletin. If operators would like to use the original issue of the applicable requirements bulletin after June 29, 2023, operators must request approval to use that service information as an alternative method of compliance (AMOC) under the provisions of paragraph (k) of this AD. The FAA has not changed the AD in this regard. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Conclusion</HD> The FAA reviewed the relevant data, considered any comments received, and determined that air safety requires adopting this AD as proposed. Accordingly, the FAA is issuing this AD to address the unsafe condition on these products. Except for minor editorial changes, this AD is adopted as proposed in the NPRM. None of the changes will increase the economic burden on any operator. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Material Incorporated by Reference Under 1 CFR Part 51</HD> The FAA reviewed Boeing Special Attention Requirements Bulletin 737-25-1866 RB, Revision 2, dated July 19, 2024. This material specifies procedures for inspecting all escape slide assemblies to identify any escape slide assembly having part number (P/N) 5A3307-7 and replacing it with an assembly having P/N 5A3307-9 or P/N 5A3307-701. Escape slide assembly P/N 5A3307-701 is one on which a firing cable retention has been modified and the assembly has been reidentified with a new part number. This AD also requires Boeing Special Attention Requirements Bulletin 737-25-1855 RB, Revision 1, dated April 13, 2022; and Boeing Special Attention Requirements Bulletin 737-25-1866 RB, Revision 1, dated April 11, 2022, which the Director of the Federal Register approved for incorporation by reference as of June 29, 2023 (88 FR 33817, May 25, 2023). This material is reasonably available because the interested parties have access to it through their normal course of business or by the means identified in the <E T="02">ADDRESSES</E> section. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Costs of Compliance</HD> The FAA estimates that this AD affects 2,666 airplanes of U.S. registry. The FAA estimates the following costs to comply with this AD: <GPOTABLE COLS="05" OPTS="L2,nj,i1" CDEF="s50,r25,10,10,r25"> <TTITLE>Estimated Costs</TTITLE> <CHED H="1">Action</CHED> <CHED H="1">Labor cost</CHED> <CHED H="1">Parts cost</CHED> Cost on U.S. operators </CHED> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Inspection or maintenance records review (retained action from AD 2023-09-04)</ENT> <ENT>2 work-hours × $85 per hour = $170</ENT> <ENT>$0</ENT> <ENT>$170</ENT> <ENT>$425,340 (2,502 airplanes)</ENT> </ROW> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Inspection or maintenance records review (new action)</ENT> <ENT>2 work-hours × $85 per hour = $170</ENT> <ENT>0</ENT> <ENT>170</ENT> <ENT>$27,880 (164 airplanes)</ENT> </ROW> </GPOTABLE> The FAA estimates the following costs to do any replacements that would be required based on the results of the inspection. The agency has no way of determining the number of aircraft that might need these replacements: <GPOTABLE COLS="04" OPTS="L2,nj,i1" CDEF="xs72,r50,xs72,r50"> <TTITLE>On-Condition Costs</TTITLE> <CHED H="1">Action</CHED> <CHED H="1">Labor cost</CHED> <CHED H="1">Parts cost</CHED> <CHED H="1">Cost per product</CHED> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Replacement</ENT> <ENT>Up to 1 work hour × $85 per hour = up to $85</ENT> <ENT>Up to $19,000</ENT> <ENT>Up to $19,085 per escape slide assembly.</ENT> </ROW> </GPOTABLE> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Authority for This Rulemaking</HD> Title 49 of the United States Code specifies the FAA's authority to issue rules on aviation safety. Subtitle I, section 106, describes the authority of the FAA Administrator. Subtitle VII: Aviation Programs, describes in more detail the scope of the Agency's authority. The FAA is issuing this rulemaking under the authority described in Subtitle VII, Part A, Subpart III, Section 44701: General requirements. Under that section, Congress charges the FAA with promoting safe flight of civil aircraft in air commerce by prescribing regulations for practices, methods, and procedures the A ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 24k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━