Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

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Bracebrace
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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by Bracebrace »

It's actually the "mayday" that makes everyone shut up and listen and triggers the tower to send the fire trucks. The "request assistance" is obsolete on many airports, but done because the call is standard.
Last edited by Bracebrace on 10 Sep 2015, 23:03, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

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NTSB Update on the British Airways Engine Fire at Las Vegas

As part of its ongoing investigation into Tuesday’s engine fire that occurred during takeoff of British Airways flight 2276, a Boeing 777, at McCarran International Airport (LAS), the NTSB today released the following investigative update.

NTSB investigators arrived on scene Wednesday morning local time to begin the on-scene investigation. The NTSB investigative team includes experts in powerplants, airplane systems, and fire. The following groups will be organized: powerplants, airworthiness (airplane structure, systems, and fire), flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder.

Parties to the NTSB investigation are the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), The Boeing Company, and GE Aviation. In accordance with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Annex 13, the UK Air Accidents Investigations Branch (AAIB), as the State of the Operator, has appointed an accredited representative to assist the investigation. The UK accredited representative has initially appointed British Airways and the UK Civil Aviation Authority as technical advisors.

The following are the initial factual findings:

•British Airways flight 2276, a Boeing 777-200ER, equipped with two GE90-85B engines, registration G-VIIO, was operating under the provisions of 14 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Part 129 and was enroute to London - Gatwick Airport (LGW), Horley, England.

•There were 157 passengers, including 1 lap child, and 13 crew members on board. There were several minor injuries as a result of the evacuation (mostly abrasions).

•The flight data recorder, cockpit voice recorder and quick access recorder have arrived at the NTSB Vehicle Recorder Laboratory and are currently being downloaded.

•On Tuesday evening, the airplane was photographed and the runway debris documented by FAA and airport officials before airplane was towed to secluded area of the airport (in order to reopen the runway).

•Initial examination of the left engine revealed multiple breaches of the engine case in the area around the high pressure compressor.

•Examination of the material recovered from runway found several pieces of the high pressure compressor spool (approximately 7-8 inches in length).

•Initial examination of the airplane by NTSB revealed that the left engine and pylon, left fuselage structure and inboard left wing airplane were substantially damaged by the fire. This damage will be documented over the next several days.

The powerplants and airworthiness groups will continue documenting the airplane and engine over the next several days. It is anticipated that once the tooling is in place, the left engine will be removed and shipped to a facility to conduct a full teardown.

Source:
http://www.ntsb.gov/news/press-releases ... 50910.aspx

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

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New video (ABC News) with a few seconds view from the inside:


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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by sn26567 »

The British Airways captain, Chris Henkey, 63, from Reading, Berkshire in the United Kingdom has 42 years of flying experience with BA and was on his penultimate flight before leaving the profession.

He told NBC News he is "unlikely" to make his final flight, which would have taken him to Barbados to join his daughter in his favorite vacation destination.

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by sean1982 »

Its a shame they couldnt find a more flattering picture of the guy :D

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by sn26567 »

National Transportation Safety Board spokesman Eric Weiss said this Monday that the damaged engine will be removed from a British Airways aircraft that aborted takeoff and caught fire on a Las Vegas airport runway.

The engine will be taken to a General Electric facility for more tests by NTSB, Boeing and GE investigators.
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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by sn26567 »

FAA warned Boeing about the flaw that caused a 777 engine to explode

When a jetliner’s engine explodes moments before take off, people ask questions. Now, less than a week after that very thing happened to a British Airways 777, answers are starting to emerge—and they’re scary.

Turns out the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) warned both Boeing and General Electric, the 777’s engine-maker, about a flaw in the plane’s engine design that could result in the very catastrophe that took place last week at McCarran Airport in Las Vegas.

What’s worse is that the safety warning was issued over four years ago. The FAA warned that cracks could form in the engine’s high-pressure compressor spool causing “uncontained engine failure and damage to the airplane.” In other words, the FAA knew that the engine’s turbines could fail under stress, causing an explosion and a shower of debris big enough to set the rest of the plane on fire.

That’s exactly what happened to the 777 in Las Vegas.

The FAA issued a new airworthiness directive for the 777 engine in question that required additional inspections to spot the cracks before they caused a catastrophic event.

GE finally responded to the controversy and said that the particular engine on the British Airways 777—the GE90-85B—featured a different compressor stool configuration than the engine cited in the FAA airworthiness directive. However, the model name is clearly listed on the FAA’s warning as the GE90-85B, and it remains unclear how the newly configured engine was inspected.

Full story: http://gizmodo.com/the-faa-warned-boein ... 1730504726
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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

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sn26567 wrote:FAA warned Boeing about the flaw that caused a 777 engine to explode

When a jetliner’s engine explodes moments before take off, people ask questions. Now, less than a week after that very thing happened to a British Airways 777, answers are starting to emerge—and they’re scary.
Turns out the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) warned both Boeing and General Electric, the 777’s engine-maker, about a flaw in the plane’s engine design that could result in the very catastrophe that took place last week at McCarran Airport in Las Vegas.
What’s worse is that the safety warning was issued over four years ago. The FAA warned that cracks could form in the engine’s high-pressure compressor spool causing “uncontained engine failure and damage to the airplane.” In other words, the FAA knew that the engine’s turbines could fail under stress, causing an explosion and a shower of debris big enough to set the rest of the plane on fire.
That’s exactly what happened to the 777 in Las Vegas.
The FAA issued a new airworthiness directive for the 777 engine in question that required additional inspections to spot the cracks before they caused a catastrophic event.
GE finally responded to the controversy and said that the particular engine on the British Airways 777—the GE90-85B—featured a different compressor stool configuration than the engine cited in the FAA airworthiness directive. However, the model name is clearly listed on the FAA’s warning as the GE90-85B, and it remains unclear how the newly configured engine was inspected.
Full story: http://gizmodo.com/the-faa-warned-boein ... 1730504726
Update about this from The Aviation Herald:

On Sep 15th 2015 media reports started to surface claiming that the FAA had made links between an Airworthiness Directive (AD) FAA-2010-1024 issued by the FAA in 2011 concerning a weld joint between 9th and 10th stage of the HPCR spool 8-10, where cracks had been discovered during examination of an engine, the FAA rated that condition as potentially unsafe and required additional inspections of GE90-76B, GE90-77B, GE90-85B, GE90-90B and GE90-94B engines. General Electric states however, that the BA B772 was equipped with different parts, for which this AD FAA-2010-1024 is not applicable.

http://avherald.com/h?article=48c10434&opt=0

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by sn26567 »

Of course, every company involved will try to blame another one and ignore its own responsibilities.

GE said that the particular engine on the British Airways 777—the GE90-85B—featured a different compressor stool configuration than the engine cited in the FAA airworthiness directive. However, the model name is clearly listed on the FAA’s warning as the GE90-85B.

Now what?
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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by KriVa »

Just because the model name is listed, does not mean that it is exactly the same, as far as I know. The specific AD might only be in reference to certain serial numbers, or batches. If the engine/engine components are not within those batches, then there's no reason for them to follow up on the AD.
I don't know whether it is the case, but I think GE would be fairly current on where which engine is, certainly within large western airlines. BA and GE work rather closely together, dating back to well before this incident.
Even if the AD would be relevant to this engine, I don't see BA as one of those carries that will just sign off on an AD without having done the job that needed to be done.
Thomas

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by RTM »

Correct KriVa.
Though I have seen AD's where the innitial issue involved certain batches and/or serial number ranges, but get on a later date revised to get a wider range of applicability. Meaning more serial numbers and/or batches that in the Original issue were not mentioned, are affected. So one needs to keep an open mind that something like that is a possibility. Maybe not all serial numbers and/or batches were properly identified during the initial issue of this AD. But without knowing the details, that is hard to Judge for us. Investigation will bring that to light.
sn26567 wrote:Of course, every company involved will try to blame another one and ignore its own responsibilities.

Now what?
I don't think GE is trying to shift the blame to anybody here in this case. They are just commenting that the engine involved was not covered by the AD, meaning further investigation will have to be done to reveal what happened. And even if the engine was covered by this AD, that would not mean that the issue described in this AD is the cause of the problem. But I think GE is very well aware that it is their product that failed, and they are cooperating with the investigation. No use in trying to shift the blame. Not yet...

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

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NTSB investigators have supervised the removal of the damaged engine of the Boeing 777 in Las Vegas.

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by RTM »

Would love to see a pic from the other side...

Also, I see they removed the fan for some reason... Curious why that would be...

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by sabtech81 »

RTM wrote:Would love to see a pic from the other side...

Also, I see they removed the fan for some reason... Curious why that would be...
A GE90, as a GenX, is too big to be transported in 1 piece in most of the cargo A/C so they can remove and transport fan part and core part separately. Hence the removal of the fan blades to be able to separate fan and core section.

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by airazurxtror »

Passengers were criticised on social media for grabbing hand luggage and personal belongings before evacuating the plane, contrary to safety guidelines.

Many defended it as an instinctive reaction amid the panic while others, who had left items such as passports behind, faced longer waits for an alternative flight home.
IF IT AIN'T BOEING, I'M NOT GOING.

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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by sn26567 »

From The Aviation Herald and ATW online:

On Oct 6th 2015 the NTSB reported “Engine examination revealed that a portion of the stage 8-10 spool in the high-pressure compressor section had failed, liberating fragments that breached the engine case and cowling,” NTSB said. “Additional pieces of the HPC spool were recovered from inside the engine and retained for metallurgical examination … The fracture initiated in the HPC stage 8 disk web, a part of the stage 8-10 spool.
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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

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Passengers on a British Airways plane that caught fire taking off from Las Vegas in September are suing the makers of the plane and its engines in Chicago, their lawyers said on Friday (27 Nov).

The engine of the Boeing 777 burst into flames, forcing all 170 passengers and crew to escape via emergency slides, after a part of a spool in the high-pressure compressor failed, according to findings from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).

Now 65 passengers from the United States, Britain, Northern Ireland, Ireland and Germany are seeking damages from Boeing and engine maker GE for pain, suffering, emotional stress as well as financial losses, law firm Stewarts Law said in a statement.

James Healy-Pratt, head of aviation and travel law at Stewarts Law, told Reuters the lawsuit did not specify any amount but that if there ended up being 100 claimants, then $100 million "would not be unthinkable". He said previously U.S. courts had been known to award in excess of $500,000 per passenger.

"Our clients are not critical of BA and feel that the pilots and cabin crew performed heroically in guiding the aircraft to an emergency stop, and then evacuating all occupants away from the burning aircraft in difficult circumstances," Healy-Pratt said in the statement.

But Stewarts Law and U.S. counsel, the Wisner Law Firm, say that at the time of the accident the Boeing aircraft, equipped with GE engines, was "defective and unreasonably dangerous in a number of important respects".

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2015/11/2 ... TC20151127
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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by Duke »

Has a decision already been taken about the future of this particular aircraft?
Will it be written off or repaired?
Thanks,

Duke


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Re: Spectacular British Airways Boeing 777 left-engine fire on take-off roll Las Vegas

Post by RTM »

Repair is progressing well.


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