What does that mean - STILL on the aeroplane - if he as trying to fly somewhere of course he would still be on there after fixing it! The alternative being "Oh I have fixed it now, but not sure about it, so I'm not getting back on this plane"?
Bollocks - the guy wanted to go somewhere and didn't want extra delay - so he looked to see if he could fix it - clearly he did and perhaps was lucky a spare part was not required.