Discovery of oil leaks keeps Qantas A380s grounded
Date added: 8 November, 2010
a mid-air engine failure found oil leaks in three crafts’ turbines.
Trent 900 engines exploded mid-flight last Thursday, forcing the Qantas aircraft
carrying it to make an emergency landing in Singapore.
Qantas chief executive, told a news conference in Sydney
of the relevant turbine area, however, investigations on other areas of the engine
are continuing in order to rule out other potential issues.’
72 hours as it works with Rolls-Royce and Airbus engineers to carry out inspections
in Sydney and Los Angeles.
engine – was also forced to return to Singapore last Friday after reporting an
engine problem.
several months previously by European officials that there were potential safety
problems with the Trent 900 engines.
wear on the splines of the engine’s intermediate pressure (IP) turbine that could
lead to ‘in-flight shut down, oil migration and oil fire’.
was specific to the Trent 900 engine and unrelated to another event involving
a Trent 1000 that occurred in August 2010 on a test-bed in Derby.
with operators of the Trent 900-powered A380 and with the airworthiness authorities.
These are being progressively completed, which is allowing a resumption of operation
of aircraft in full compliance with all safety standards. We are working in close
cooperation with Airbus, our customers and the authorities, and, as always, safety
remains our highest priority…
engine since 1994. Since then, Rolls-Royce has accumulated 142 million hours of
flight on Trent and RB211 engines.’
by Martin Ferguson
three days while it continues to investigate engine anomalies.
that oil was found to have leaked in some of the Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines.
given the aircraft were only two years old.
as required" to indentify the problem.
the aircraft is safe to fly,” he said.
pounds off of its market value since a Qantas aircraft was forced to make an emergency
landing in Singapore last week.
to the eruption of Mount Merapi, a thousand or more miles away.
Posted: Monday, November 8th, 2010. Filed in General News.