US aircraft maker Boeing paid Alaska Airlines some $160 million in compensation after an incident involving a torn-out fuselage section on a Boeing 737-9 MAX aircraft in January which led to the grounding of the model. On January 5, a defective door plug flew off an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 MAX 9 shortly after taking off from Portland in the US state of Oregon. The mid-air blow-out left a gaping hole in the plane and forced an emergency landing. None of the more than 170 people on board were injured. As a result, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) grounded the MAX 9 aircraft featur…