Residents take photos of debris that fell from a United Airlines plane’s engine in the Broomfield area outside Denver, Colorado, on February 20, 2021. A United Airlines flight had a severe engine outage on February 20, shortly after taking off from Denver en route to Hawaii, dumping massive debris on a residential area before a safe emergency landing, officials said.
Chet Stranger | AFP | Getty Images
United Airlines said on Sunday that it would temporarily take 24 of its Boeing 777s out of service after one of the planes had an engine outage over the weekend, causing an emergency landing.
The head of the Federal Aviation Administration said Sunday that the agency will inspect the inspection of some Boeing 777 aircraft powered by the same Pratt and Whitney engine, the PW4000.
The Japanese aviation regulator has ordered airlines to suspend flights of aircraft with this type of engine until further notice, the FAA said. United is the only American airline with these types of engines in its fleet.
United Flight 328 made an emergency landing at Denver International Airport shortly after takeoff on Saturday afternoon after the right car broke down. No one was injured on board, but debris, including the large car cover, fell in the area.
The National Transportation Safety Board and the FAA are investigating the incident.
“We checked all available safety data after yesterday’s incident. Based on the initial information, we concluded that the inspection interval should be sharpened for the hollow fan blades unique to this engine model, which is only available on Boeing 777- aircraft are used, “the FAA said. administrator Steve Dickson said in a statement.
United still has 28 of these aircraft in its fleet currently being stored. Airlines have parked or retired dozens of aircraft after demand fell due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Engine manufacturer Pratt and Whitney, a unit of Raytheon Technologies, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.