The incident comes on the heels of Southwest Airlines Flight 1380 which made an emergency landing in Philadelphia after an uncontained engine failure blew out one of the Boeing 737's windows on April 17. The resulting decompression nearly sucked a passenger out of the window. That passenger, Jennifer Riordan, later died from her injuries.
Fortunately for Flight 957, the aircraft did not depressurize and no injuries have been reported.
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This leads us to ask the question: What is an airplane window made of and what kind of forces can it take?
The windows on a modern airliner are actually made up of multiple layers, usually three, of acrylic with a plastic inner cover. The three layers are gapped and vented. This is to allow for pressure equalization and to prevent the windows from fogging. The material used to make the windows is rather durable and, following federal regulations, won't splinter when damaged.
It's unclear what caused the window to fail on Flight 957.
Since the windows are essentially made from plexiglass, they aren't bulletproof. However, they rarely fail. And even if they do, modern airliners such as the Boeing 737 used to operate Flight 1380 can survive and land after most depressurization events.
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