Welcome back to the Ten Blocks podcast. I'm Jordan McGillis, economics editor of City Journal.

Joining me on the show today is Gary Leff. Gary is a world-renowned travel expert. His blog, View from the Wing, is among the

internet's most widely read on the topics of airlines, hotels, and credit cards. Like countless

other millennials, I've used Gary's View from the Wing and a few other

publications to help optimize my travel strategy to make the most of my points in miles. But I think

what sets view from the wing apart is Gary's insights on the travel industry itself versus just

the consumer experience and his understanding of how politics and regulation affect that

industry. Gary, thanks for joining us.

Thank you. Happy to be here in chat with, I mean, there's a lot going on in aviation.

Absolutely. First and foremost, we are recording this podcast just a couple of days after a

frightening incident on an Alaska Airlines flight. There was a Boeing 737 max taking off from Portland, Oregon, and it experienced a blowout, as they're calling it, with a door literally popping off of the airplane at about 16,000 feet. Gary, what's going on here? What does this tell us about that airline?

What does it tell us about Boeing? Give us the rundown. So the challenging thing, of course,

is that we are talking not that long after it happened. And by the time of your listeners,

hear this, they may know more than we know today, right? Because there's certainly, you know,

things in the investigation that haven't been released yet. But in terms of what, just setting the

stage, the 737 max 9 is a large aircraft that in some configurations fit a lot more passengers.

And when you have a lot more passengers,

in order to evacuate an aircraft quickly in an emergency, you know, you need another exit door.

Otherwise, you just get too much of a log jam in the aisle. And in the configuration that you're

going to find from a U.S. airline that has a first class cabin,

extra-licking seats, you're not going to need that door.

And you're not going to want it because otherwise, if you're using it as an exit door,

...