The Federal Aviation Administration has ordered all McDonnell Douglas MD-11 aircraft grounded pending further inspection, following UPS and FedEx each deciding to ground the planes that make up part of their cargo fleet.
The FAA's emergency directive on Saturday prohibits flight of MD-11 aircraft because it has "determined the unsafe condition is likely to exist or develop in other products of the same type design."
The grounding comes after a UPS MD-11 plane crashed shortly after takeoff in Louisville, Ky., last week, killing 14 people.
Though the MD-11s make up a small share of UPS and FedEx's cargo fleet, some aviation experts say that depending on how long the MD-11s are grounded, it could delay holiday deliveries.
The cause of the crash is still under investigation. Boeing on Friday said in a statement that operators of MD-11 aircraft should "suspend flight operations while additional engineering analysis is performed," adding that the recommendation is "in an abundance of caution." Boeing merged with McDonnell Douglas in 1997.
Here is what to know about the MD-11 and holiday shipping.
The MD-11s make up a small percentage of the cargo fleet
The MD-11s were first introduced in 1986 and service flights began in December 1990, with the last MD-11 aircraft being manufactured in 2000, according to Boeing.
UPS said in 2023 that it would begin replacing MD-11 aircraft with more efficient Boeing 767 aircraft, according to FreightWaves. Over the last three years, FedEx has retired 20 MD-11 aircraft and had plans to retire the rest of its fleet by fiscal year 2032, John Dietrich, executive vice president and chief financial officer of FedEx Corporation, said in March.
Out of more than 500 aircraft that UPS uses, only 26 of them are MD-11s, according to the shipping company. FedEx said it has 28 MD-11s out of about 700 aircraft in its fleet.
Western Global Airlines, an air cargo company, also uses MD-11 aircraft in its fleet. NPR reached out to Western Global Airlines for comment but has not received a response.
Holiday deliveries could be impacted
Both UPS and FedEx told NPR contingency plans are in place to minimize disruption in deliveries. The companies did not share details, but some aviation experts told NPR that some cargo could be shifted to passenger planes, trains and trucks.
Jeremy Tancredi, a partner who specializes in supply chain issues at consulting firm West Monroe and who previously worked for UPS as an industrial engineer, said there could still be an impact on deliveries during the holiday season.
"As that peak volume increases and you need every bit of transportation capacity, not having 26 planes could be a real big factor for them," Tancredi told NPR.
Each MD-11 aircraft used by UPS can carry 20,000 packages, the company said.
While the MD-11s are a small part of the UPS and FedEx fleet, the delivery impacts could also depend on how long the aircraft are grounded, said Mike Stengel, a partner at AeroDynamic Advisory.
"If the grounding is extended more than a week or two, then as it creeps up on the holidays, there definitely is the possibility of packages getting delayed," Stengel told NPR.
The FAA directive to airports to reduce flights as the government shutdown lingers and air traffic controllers go without pay should not impact deliveries, Stengel also said.
"The cargo carriers have been generally insulated from the recent reductions in the caps that the FAA has placed in flight activity just the past few days, because the caps are generally for flights during the day, whereas UPS and FedEx generally fly in the middle of the night," Stengel told NPR. "So there isn't the same strain of air traffic controllers in the middle of the night."
Deliveries are expected to jump 5% during the holiday season compared to the 2024 holiday season — with 2.3 billion packages estimated to be delivered, according to consulting and analytics company ShipMatrix. It is unclear whether UPS or FedEx will adjust holiday shipping deadlines because of the MD-11 aircraft grounding.
Tancredi has advice for those looking to send packages to loved ones during the holidays: "Shop early."
"With the rail network taking on more capacity, with the ground network and trucks taking on more capacity, there's still time to order online and get your holiday packages there," he said.
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