UNDATED (CNN) -- American Airlines is doing damage control after entire rows of seats came loose on two flights. The carrier says it has identified the problem and is taking steps the fix it.
Twice in three days, an entire row of seats on American Airlines 757's came loose in mid-air. The first happened Saturday on a flight from Boston to Miami and the second was Monday on a flight from JFK to Miami. One passenger on the flight says, "The seats flipped backward, it was actually a complete nightmare and so people were essentially on the laps of the passengers behind them."
An airport patron says, "Well accidents happen all the time so it's like something that happened, no?"
The airline is inspecting 47 of its 757's. It found six with seats that were not properly secured. The problem is improperly installed saddle clamps. Now that the problem has been identified, they want passengers to know the planes are safe. David Campbell with American Airlines says, "We have a lot of confidence based on the fact that we have guys that work with seats every single day, they're engineers, they're crew chiefs, they've gone in they've determined what they believe is a potential failure but beyond the failure we're focusing our attention on making sure they're properly installed."
American filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy late last year and has been struggling with labor troubles. In the past month, more than a thousand American flights were cancelled and 12,000 were delayed.
American's pilots appear ready to come back to the bargaining table. A spokesman for the Allied Pilots Association said Tuesday it would resume contract negotiations with the airline.
In another incident Tuesday, an American Airlines flight from Chicago to London was diverted to Shannon Airport in Ireland after a passenger reported a smoky odor. American says the odor came from an overhead fan that overheated.