Tag Archives: Southwest airlines

Southwest cancels more U.S. flights as it inspects engines

Emergency personnel monitor the damaged engine of Southwest Airlines Flight 1380, which diverted to Philadelphia International Airport after the engine blew apart and shattered a window, killing one passenger, on a runway in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, April 17, 2018. REUTERS/Mark Makela

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Southwest Airlines canceled more flights on Monday as it worked to complete inspections of engines like the one that failed last week in a deadly accident over Pennsylvania.

Flightaware.com, a website that tracks aviation cancellations, said Southwest canceled 129 flights on Monday, or 3 percent of its total flights, and delayed 468 other flights, or 11 percent. By contrast, other major U.S. carriers had each canceled four or fewer flights on Monday, the website said.

Southwest said the cancellations were the result of the company’s announcement last Tuesday that it would begin voluntarily stepping up inspections of some CFM56-7B engines over the next 30 days. The airline said on Sunday it canceled about 40 flights.

It said on Monday it anticipated “minimal delays or cancellations each day due to the inspections.”

The company added it “will continue our work to minimize flight disruptions by performing inspections overnight while aircraft are not flying, and utilizing spare aircraft, when available.”

Late on Monday, Representative Bill Shuster, chairman of the U.S. House Transportation Committee, introduced an amendment to a bill to reauthorize the Federal Aviation Administration that would require regulators to ensure airline engine safety and report to Congress.

The measure would bring airlines, manufacturers, regulators and others “together to share best practices and implement actions to address airline engine safety” and require a review of regulations, guidance, and directives related to airline engine operation. The House is expected to vote on a bill to reauthorize the FAA later this week.

The FAA and European regulators on Friday ordered emergency inspections within 20 days of nearly 700 aircraft engines similar to the one involved in the fatal Southwest engine blowout.

Southwest said the cancellations were not a result of the emergency directive.

The engine explosion on Southwest flight 1380 on Tuesday was caused by a fan blade that broke off, the FAA said. The blast shattered a window, killing a passenger, in the first U.S. airline passenger fatality since 2009. Southwest has declined to answer questions about its CFM56-7B inspection program, including how many engines were inspected before the accident, and if the engine that failed had been inspected and if the new inspections turned up any problems.

A Southwest flight in August 2016 made a safe emergency landing in Florida, after a fan blade separated from the same type of engine and debris ripped a hole above the left wing prompting two service bulletins from engine manufacturer CFM International, a joint venture of General Electric and France’s Safran .

(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Peter Cooney)

FAA to order inspections of jet engines after Southwest blast

U.S. NTSB investigators are on scene examining damage to the engine of the Southwest Airlines plane in this image released from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S., April 17, 2018. NTSB/Handout via REUTERS

By Alwyn Scott and Alana Wise

(Reuters) – The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said it will order inspection of about 220 aircraft engines as investigators have found that a broken fan blade touched off an engine explosion this week on a Southwest flight, killing a passenger.

The regulator said late on Wednesday it plans to finalize the air-worthiness directive within the next two weeks. The order, which it initially proposed in August following an incident in 2016, will require ultrasonic inspection within the next six months of the fan blades on all CFM56-7B engines that have accrued a certain number of takeoffs.

Airlines said that because fan blades may have been repaired and moved to other engines, the order would affect far more than 220 of the CFM56-7Bs, which are made by a partnership of France’s Safran <SAF.PA> and General Electric <GE.N>.

The CFM56 engine on Southwest <LUV.N> flight 1380 blew apart over Pennsylvania on Tuesday, about 20 minutes after the Dallas-bound flight left New York’s LaGuardia Airport with 149 people on board. The explosion sent shrapnel ripping into the fuselage of the Boeing 737-700 plane and shattered a window.

Bank executive Jennifer Riordan, 43, was killed when she was partially pulled through a gaping hole next to her seat as the cabin suffered rapid decompression. Fellow passengers were able to pull her back inside but she died of her injuries.

On Wednesday, National Transportation Safety Board Chairman Robert Sumwalt said the incident began when one of the engine’s 24 fan blades snapped off from its hub. Investigators found that the blade had suffered metal fatigue at the point of the break.

Sumwalt said he could not yet say if the incident, the first deadly airline accident in the United States since 2009, pointed to a fleet-wide problem in the Boeing 737-700.

Southwest crews were inspecting similar engines the airline had in service, focusing on the 400 to 600 oldest of the CFM56 engines, according to a person with knowledge of the situation. It was the second time this kind of engine had failed on a Southwest jet in the past two years, prompting airlines around the world to step up inspections.

A NTSB inspection crew was also combing over the Boeing <BA.N> 737-700 for signs of what caused the engine to explode.

Sumwalt said the fan blade, after suffering metal fatigue where it attached to the engine hub, has a second fracture about halfway along its length. Pieces of the plane were found in rural Pennsylvania by investigators who tracked them on radar. The metal fatigue would not have been observable by looking at the engine from the outside, Sumwalt said.

Passengers described scenes of panic as a piece of shrapnel from the engine shattered a plane window, almost sucking Riordan out.

Riordan was a Wells Fargo <WFC.N> banking executive and well-known community volunteer from Albuquerque, New Mexico, the company said.

Videos posted on social media showed passengers grabbing for oxygen masks and screaming as the plane, piloted by Tammie Jo Shults, a former U.S. Navy fighter pilot, prepared for the descent into Philadelphia.

The airline expected to wrap up its inspection of the engines it was targeting in about 30 days.

The GE-Safran partnership that built the engine said it was sending about 40 technicians to help with Southwest’s inspections.

Pieces of the engine including its cowling – which covers its inner workings – were found about 60 miles (100 km) from Philadelphia airport, Sumwalt said. The investigation could take 12 to 15 months to complete.

In August 2016, a Southwest flight made a safe emergency landing in Pensacola, Florida, after a fan blade separated from the same type of engine and debris ripped a hole above the left wing. That incident prompted the FAA to propose last year that similar fan blades undergo ultrasonic inspections and be replaced if they failed.

(editing by David Stamp)