After a UPS plane crashed following takeoff at Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport last week, leaving more than 10 people dead, the delivery company and FedEx have decided to ground all MD-11 planes.
The move has prompted concern over deliveries, particularly ahead of the holiday season. However, both companies told Newsweek the grounding should not affect their services.
“Contingency plans are in place to ensure we can continue to deliver the reliable service our customers count on. We anticipate this grounding is temporary,” UPS said.
Meanwhile, FedEx said: “We are implementing contingency plans within our integrated air-ground network to minimize disruptions. Our teams are focused on delivering the highest standards of safety and service for our customers and team members.”
Why It Matters
On November 4, a cargo aircraft operated by UPS Airlines crashed just after takeoff from Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport in Kentucky. Flight 2976 was headed to Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Honolulu, Hawaii.
The incident, footage of which has been circulated online, has left many in shock. One aviation analyst has deemed it “one of the worst, if not the worst, air crashes for a cargo jet in U.S. history.”
Now that FedEx and UPS have grounded the planes, there are concerns about services being affected at a time when reliance on delivery companies is particularly high. According to ShipMatrix, 2.3 billion packages are forecast to be delivered this holiday season, a 5 percent increase compared to last year.
What To Know
After the crash, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) also ordered all McDonnell Douglas MD-11 and MD-11F aircraft to remain on the ground as part of an investigation into the planes’ structural safety.
In its order, titled Emergency Airworthiness Directive 2025-23-51, the agency determined “the unsafe condition” of the UPS plane that crashed was “likely to exist or develop in other products of the same type design.”
It is now therefore prohibited for any MD-11 or MD-11F plane to fly until it has been inspected and “all applicable corrective actions are performed using a method approved by the Manager, AIR-520, Continued Operational Safety Branch, FAA.”
According to UPS, 26 of its 500 aircraft are MD-11s. Meanwhile, at FedEx, the planes represent 28 of its fleet of 700 aircraft.
While the planes make up only a small number of the delivery companies’ fleets, some experts have warned that their grounding could still affect deliveries during the holiday season—given that each plane carries a significant number of deliveries. One MD-11 plane used by UPS can carry about 20,000 packages.
Jeremy Tancredi, a specialist in supply chain issues and partner at the consulting firm West Monroe, previously worked for UPS as an industrial engineer, and he told NPR, “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.”
However, both UPS and FedEx told Newsweek that they had contingency plans in place to ensure that deliveries were not affected by the grounding of the planes.
Satish Jindel, the president of the SJ Consulting Group, which provides strategic insight within the industry of transportation and logistics, told Newsweek he didn’t believe the grounding would affect holiday deliveries as MD-11s are often used on international routes.
He said most products for the holidays had already “been received in the U.S. and in the distribution centers and the stores.”
That said, Jindel added, the grounded planes and subsequent reduction in capacity could, in the near term, affect prices for international airfreight.
If it goes on for longer, he said cargo divisions of international passenger airlines may end up “leveraging the belly space of their wide-body aircraft—like Boing 777, 787, Airbus A350—to handle more freight by having passengers carry more items on board to make better use of the overhead bins.”
What People Are Saying
UPS told Newsweek: “Out of an abundance of caution and in the interest of safety, we have made the decision to temporarily ground our MD-11 fleet. The grounding is effective immediately. We made this decision proactively at the recommendation of the aircraft manufacturer. Nothing is more important to us than the safety of our employees and the communities we serve. Contingency plans are in place to ensure we can continue to deliver the reliable service our customers around the world count on.”
FedEx told Newsweek: “Safety is our highest priority at FedEx. Out of an abundance of caution, we have made the decision to ground our MD-11 fleet as we conduct a thorough safety review based on the recommendation of the manufacturer.”
What Happens Next
It is not clear how long the MD-11s will be forced to stay on the ground following the FAA’s order, but if it lasts for multiple weeks, experts have said holiday deliveries will be affected.
