Originally Posted by
lomapaseo
Ir was a disk uncontainment along with its blades, quite a bit more robust than a fan blade release. A fan blade release simply doesn't have the energy to make a big hole in a pressurized cabin.
If the reference is to SW 3472, it seems to have been a fan blade, unless the final report, which I can't find, discovered a disk failure not seen early in the investigation, which seems unlikely.
Investigative Update (SW 3472)
Initial findings from the engine examination include:
One fan blade separated from the fan disk during the accident flight and
The root of the separated fan blade remained in the fan hub; however, the remainder of the blade was not recovered.
Initial findings from the metallurgical examination conducted in the NTSB Materials Laboratory include:
The fracture surface of the missing blade showed curving crack arrest lines consistent with fatigue crack growth. The fatigue crack region was 1.14-inches long and 0.217-inch deep,
The center of the fatigue origin area was about 2.1 inches aft of the forward face of the blade root. No surface or material anomalies were noted during an examination of the fatigue crack origin using scanning electron microscopy and energy-dispersive x-ray spectroscopy, and
The blades are manufactured of a titanium alloy and the root contact face is coated with a copper-nickel-indium alloy.