Southwest to ground 79 planes

Passengers describe emergency landingSTORY HIGHLIGHTSA 3- to 4-foot hole is discovered in a plane's fuselageFAA: The captain made a rapid descent from 36,000 feet to 11,000 feetPassengers arrive in Sacramento, California, on a second plane (CNN) -- Southwest Airlines announced Saturday that it is grounding 79 planes for inspection following an incident in which one of its flights was forced to make an emergency landing after a 3- to 4-foot hole tore open in the fuselage of the plane.

The plane -- which had been traveling from Phoenix to Sacramento, California -- managed to land safely at a military base in Yuma, Arizona, on Friday. There authorities "discovered a hole in the top of the aircraft," the company said earlier.

Investigators are trying to determine what caused the "depressurization event" and have "decided to keep a subset of its Boeing 737 fleet out of the flying schedule to begin an aggressive inspection effort in cooperation with Boeing engineers," according to a company statement.

"The safety of our customers and employees is our primary concern, and we are grateful there were no serious injuries," said Mike Van de Ven, Southwest's executive vice president and chief operating officer.

The airline initially reported that 81 of its Boeing 737 aircraft would be grounded, but later decreased the number of planes to be inspected for what it called "aircraft skin fatigue." The inspections will take place at five locations over the course of the next several days, the airline said.

Meanwhile, passengers who were aboard the crippled the Boeing 737 said they had feared for their lives.

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