Originally posted by
Deepinsider:
Was his role instrumental in this product design/support disaster, or is he just unlucky with the restructure timing?
(either way, it will be very tricky writing his next CV
Noting
infrequentflyer789 comments, someone from CFM might well be needing CV advice too!)
I am not sure you are very familiar with design, testing, manufacturing and servicing of commercial turbofan engines in the aircraft engine industry today. First of all, Rolls Royce is in the process of restructuring their business organizations to eliminate duplications and eliminating businesses that don't contribute much to bottom line profitability with the goal of reducing costs to become more competitive in the marketplace. So are both GE and Pratt & Whitney. It is not unusual today in any business that wants to survive as a viable future business, even businesses that are not producing jet engines. Although there are technical issues on current engines in the field to be resolved, Rolls Royce has to stay cost competitive in the marketplace so don't confuse that business goal with a technical problem that will be resolved.
Secondly, you and
infrequentflyer789 should understand that there have been over 30,000 CFM56 engines operating in the field since 1982. An aircraft with CFM56 engines takes off every three minutes 24-7, 365 days a year somewhere in the world, think about that for a moment. The idea that the CFM56 management structure should be overhauled, as suggested, because of two unfortunate technical incidents in 2018 is a bit of an overkill. Southwest Airlines had ultrasonically inspected 17,000 fan blades as a result of the first failure but before the second failure took place. No fan blades exhibiting fatigue cracks were found in any of the blades inspected. The CFM56 engines in the field have accumulated more than 30 million flight hours without any indication of the fan blade failures experienced in these two events. If anything, there may be improvements capable of being made to the engine inlet cowl to improve durability and absorb more of the energy when a fan blade is released, some potential improvements learned as result of these two incidents.