Good points Two's in
In the early days of the Harrier/Pegasus combination we had fan rubs following very high pitch rate manoeuvres. The pitch rates (and so gyroscopic forces) involved were way beyond the envelope then used for designing engines and were achieved during low speed combat manoeuvres made possible by using the reaction controls. The engine men sorted it as a normal part of the aircraft/engine development programme.
The other similar development issue was that the USMC used the nozzle lever at high IAS to destroy the enemies aiming solution. This raised much higher stresses in the nozzle actuation system than was expected as they had only been designed for up to 250kt IAS.
Easy – tell them not to do it said the designers.
Rubbish said the company pilots because if it helps pilots to achieve their task pilots will do it (whatever it is). So we strengthened things to allow them to go to reverse thrust at reasonably high speeds and made the actuator stall at about 40deg nozzle at silly speeds. After this initial nozzle deflection killed the speed a tad the actuator unstalled and the nozzles went all the way.
So I wonder if the rub that caused the fire resulted from a manoeuvre inside or outside the engine design spec and so will the accountants I guess.
As for the manoeuvre itself, if it turns out that the aerodynamics can hand out more than was expected that will be very good news for operators in the longer term. However in the end the engine men will have to tolerate what the airframe can do.