During turnaround in AMS yesterday an engineer said they were doing a double engine change for Martinair. Said both engines were full of glass, sand that had melted and then vitrified(?).They had gone through the sand on arrival, and then brought the aircraft back from Izmir and had a second dose.
Glad everyone seems to be OK.
My only query is, having gone down through it and landed OK, why would you want to launch off and have another shot at it?
The problem with the report above is that it scares the crap out of me. Once you have factual eveidence (via borescope or teardown) that a single operation in an environemental encounter with sand or ash has produced glass deposits in the turbine inlet you must presume that similar encounters under similar turbine inlet temperatures (TIT) in other engines and aircraft flights has poisoned a much larger fleet (seen that before)
Glassification is permanent and only a teardown and overhaul will get rid of it. It also is deadly to the engine surge margin and safe operation and folks it's
All engines on an aircraft so whether you're a 4 holer or a 2 holer somebody is going to end up as a glider.
The key to mitigation is avoidance and if that fails then reduce the turbine inlet temperature to something less than cruize temeperatures (you work out the math). Should you not be able to perform this mitigation
do not ever fly these engines again until you have cleared it via borescope
No engine is immune from this if it is operating with a high enough turbine inlet temperature. So once one guy has it all engine manufacturers must be made aware of the findings and an all operator wire sent out immediately.
Right now I consider this still a rumor of the finding, but
beware if it turns out to be true.