‘Diversity’ airline suffers multiple emergencies in one week

An airline giant known for hiring employees based on skin color and gender suffered four emergencies last week, some of which threatened the lives of passengers.

On Friday a United Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Mexico made an emergency landing due to a reported complete failure of one of the plane’s four hydraulic systems. Airplane hydraulic systems control the high-pressure fluid that helps operate some of the aircraft’s crucial functions, such as flight control and landing gear operation.

While the United Airbus A320 made a safe landing and the plane’s 110 passengers transferred to another plane, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said it will be investigating the incident.

Earlier that day, 160 passengers aboard a United Airlines Boeing 737 flight in Houston had to be evacuated when the plane veered off the runway.

The day before a United Airlines flight from San Francisco to Japan was diverted to Los Angeles after one of the wheels fell off the plane. The wheel fell in a parking lot and damaged several vehicles.

On Monday, United Flight 1118 was in the air less than 10 minutes before it had to turn around due to the engine catching fire. 

In 2021 United Airlines set a goal to make 50% of its pilots either women or “people of color” by 2030. The company has since exceeded its target and last year boasted in its diversity report that nearly 80 percent of the 51 first class pilot graduates were women or people of color.

As part of its diversity push, United recruits employees from historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), some of which are the poorest performing in the nation. Delaware State and Elizabeth City State Universities, for example — both of whom have partnered with United — are reportedly in the bottom 2% of all undergraduate institutions in the United States. At Elizabeth City State, the average SAT score is said to be lower than if a test taker simply answered “B” for all multiple choice questions.

This has raised several concerns about the competency of United’s employees, some of whom were fired for incompetence but rehired through diversity programs.