Plane engine that caught fire on United Airlines flight over Denver has troubled history

The engine of the Pratt & Whitney plane that caught fire and forced a United Airlines pilot to make an emergency landing shortly after takeoff from Denver has seen similar eruptions on at least two other flights, said experts Monday.

Three years ago, a fan blade broke on one of the PW4000 engines powering another United Airlines Boeing 777-200 aircraft, this time flying over the Pacific Ocean on a flight from San Francisco to Honolulu.

And in December, two fan blades of the same type of engine broke on a Japan Airlines Boeing 777-200 that was flying from Naha to Tokyo.

Just like in Denver, the pilots of these two flights were able to land their planes safely and no one was injured.

“This isn’t the first time this has happened,” aviation expert Greg Feith said on NBC’s “Today” show, referring to the malfunction of the PW4000 engine.

But after Saturday’s fiery episode in the Colorado skies, images of which went viral on social media, Boeing grounded all of its old 777-200 planes around the world as federal investigators inspect PW4000 engines. planes, which are only used by United. Airlines in the United States and airlines in Japan and South Korea.

In particular, Federal Aviation Administration administrator Steve Dickson said inspections were “stepped up for the hollow fan blades which are unique to this engine model, used only on Boeing 777 aircraft.”

Former National Transportation Safety Board Chairman Jim Hall said faulty blades are only found on “the first generation” of PW4000 engines.

“I suspect the reason the planes are all being pulled is because they (the FAA and Pratt & Whitney) don’t have an inspection process in place and they’re embarrassed,” Hall told NBC News. “Over the past decade, the FAA has responded to the economic interests of the aviation industry, which has taken precedence over safety.”

Pratt & Whitney, who is owned by Raytheon, insisted he was cooperating with federal investigators.

“United Airlines Flight 328 is currently under an NTSB investigation and Pratt & Whitney has dispatched a team to work with investigators,” the company said in a statement. “Pratt & Whitney is actively coordinating with operators and regulators to support the revised inspection interval for the Pratt & Whitney PW4000 engines that power the Boeing 777s.”

But an NTSB investigation into a February 13, 2018 Pratt & Whitney engine malfunction on the United flight to Honolulu criticized the company for failing to conduct more stringent inspections.

“The lack of training led the inspector to incorrectly assess an indication that resulted in a blade being returned to service with a crack where it ultimately fractured,” the report said.

Boeing also said it was cooperating with the federal government. “We believe every survey is an opportunity to learn how the industry can continue to make air travel safer for everyone,” the company said in a statement.

Feith said the Boeing 777-200s have safeguards to prevent them from crashing after this type of engine malfunction.

“The FAA requires the manufacturer of a twin-engine aircraft like this to certify it so that it can fly on one engine, which it has done,” Feith said.

Yet the fact that the flames have taken so long to extinguish raises troubling new questions about the safety of the PW4000 engine, he said.

“If this plane had been flying over the ocean for an hour or two, the biggest concern is that there is a fire extinguisher system on the engine and the fire continues to burn,” he said. declared.

United flight 328, to Honolulu with 231 people on board, reported problems on Saturday shortly after take off from Denver.

Video from a passenger showed one of the plane’s engines burning and falling apart before debris began to rain on suburban Denver as the pilot signaled “mayday” to the control tower and walked away. started to turn around.

A similar scenario played out on another Boeing plane in Holland on Saturday. A Boeing 747-400 cargo plane, powered by a smaller version of the PW4000 engines, began to lose engine parts shortly after taking off from Maastricht airport on Saturday.

No one was injured and Dutch authorities are investigating the incident.