SWA1380 - diversion to KPHL after engine event
...front of nacelle 1 shredded/missing, not clear of cause (yet). Landed safe, no slides, evac via stairway.
http://6abc.com/live-southwest-plane...t-phl/3356147/ |
Woman partially sucked out after engine parts break window.
https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news...480008613.html |
http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b7...swmufifqm.jpeg
The female passenger is in critical condition with head trauma because of flying debris from the engine. |
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1 Attachment(s)
Pic of engine.
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This will probably be raised as a serious accident and investigated by the NTSB.
This means details other than passenger comments will flow from the NTSB |
No doubt there was considerable panic/discomfort in the cabin. Well done to all, including pax.
I was interested looking at the LED's on left side. They would be out of sight from LHS FD. Equally the engine nacelle was out of sight. Much would depend on CA <10,000, or perhaps a pilot did have a look. That would be interesting to know. The reason I'm curious is that there have been engine blow-ups that damaged LED's and caused an uncontrollable UAP/roll when deployed. I wonder if they conducted a flight control/flap test at 10,000'. This is such a rare event, and certainly not trained for, so anything the rest of us could learn is immensely valuable. I appreciate most would want to be the ground PDQ, but much can depend on where you are, where your target is and what the state of pax & cabin is. I'm not suggesting something so simple. The report, which would tell us, could take a long time, but the passing of knowledge might be more beneficial if quicker. |
Well despite the missing inlet it appears that the bulk of the fan is still there:
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Question to the professionals here. One pax elsewhere in the aircraft, seemed to think they were already at 30,000'. Taking off from LGA and having just reached to SW part of NY, would they have been at this altitude that quickly? I question this because I think the situation with the pax next to the window might have been a lot worse at 30,000'. ??
Not minimizing the situation at all. Helluva an ordeal either way you look at it. |
City,
SWA1380 had filed for FL380, and was climbing through FL325 when the immediate descent began. At this point, the airplane was approaching the Susquehanna river in southern Pennsylvania. The closest suitable airport with airliner services and emergency services was MDT, but they needed a distance for the descent. PHL was a good choice as they had to go that far anyway during the descent, and SWA has a large base at PHL. BWI would have been another option, slightly further away. You can view the lateral flight track and the altitude track. |
Thanks Feathered. The news is filtering more details and the woman involved was indeed seriously injured with a major head wound. That window breach, at that altitude...I can't imagine witnessing such a horrific event.
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From the CNN link above:
CNN aviation analyst Peter Goelz said a type of engine that is usually "extraordinarily reliable" likely came apart on the Southwest flight, causing today's emergency landing. "I have been on scene on these kinds of disasters — they're very rare, the turbofan engine is extraordinarily reliable," he said. "But in this case it looks like it came apart midair." |
Originally Posted by India Four Two
(Post 10121628)
From the CNN link above:
My bold. Is this the best CNN can do in terms of an “aviation analyst”? :ugh: Uncontained CFM56-7 Failure: Southwest B737-700 27 August 2016 - Aerossurance Have to take a CFM LEAP of faith if flying on a -700.... |
Originally Posted by ion_berkley
(Post 10121574)
Well despite the missing inlet it appears that the bulk of the fan is still there:
If there is a blade gone then this is looking awfully awfully similar to N766SW, same airline and type. That ought to sound alarm bells at NTSB. Accident: Southwest B737 near Pensacola on Aug 27th 2016, uncontained engine failure https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southw...es_Flight_3472 Compare this pic (from N766SW) for instance: http://avherald.com/img/southwest_b7...a_160827_3.jpg Or look at this one and think impact point slightly up and right (in image coordinates): http://avherald.com/img/southwest_b7...a_160827_2.jpg Not sure which window went, but that would be my guess from the interior photo. |
Looking at the pic (https://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/...l) of the window it appears that the piece of shrapnel did not penetrate the outer pane but came in at an angle, puncturing the skin adhacent to the window frame and then shattering the inner pane.
Edit: in light of later reports and photos this is clearly wrong, the outer pane is indeed missing (it appears to be intact due to the quality of the photo). |
Photos show the damaged window just aft of the wing. In the window photo above you can see the trailing edge and flaps.
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Originally Posted by andrasz
(Post 10121650)
Looking at the pic of the window it appears that the piece of shrapnel did not penetrate the outer pane but came in at an angle, puncturing the skin adhacent to the window frame and then shattering the inner pane.
Could equally have been something heavy from the cowl, for example a big lump of bleed air valve for the engine ice kit, even if the blades had been contained. |
In the photo posted by Jet Jockey A4 the outer window shows no apparent damage. I know there is a hole in passenger windows to equalize pressure. Is it possible the window may have blown, not from "shrapnel" but as a result of the rapid decompression?
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Coincidence that it is Southwest again (August 2016)? How old is the aircraft? Maintenance issues?? Quality issues???
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Originally Posted by brika
(Post 10121680)
Coincidence that it is Southwest again (August 2016)? How old is the aircraft? Maintenance issues?? Quality issues???
Preliminary investigation determined that the fracture in the blade initiated from the fan blade dovetail. This condition, if not detected and corrected, could lead to fan blade failure, possibly resulting in uncontained forward release of debris, with consequent damage to the engine and the aeroplane. To address this potential unsafe condition, CFM International issued CFM56-7B SB No. 72-1019, later revised, and CFM56-7B SB No. 72-1024, providing inspection instructions. Looks like the port slat has taken a good old smashing along its length too. Fasteners open, but wouldnt be surprised if they have popped from the force of whatever happened. |
Injured pax was reportedly seated in 14A which, as already noted, is just forward of the wing trailing edge.
That, and the indications that whatever penetrated the cabin was travelling at an angle and not tangentially, would suggest that it wasn't a liberated fan or turbine blade. |
Originally Posted by andrasz
(Post 10121650)
Looking at the pic (https://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/...l) of the window it appears that the piece of shrapnel did not penetrate the outer pane but came in at an angle, puncturing the skin adhacent to the window frame and then shattering the inner pane.
FWIW-despite the claim of passenger almost sucked out- the photo seems to show the outer pane mostly/all intact. And a close look at the bottom of what remains of the inner pane ( actually about 1/8 thick plastic seems to shows the typical center small dia hole (one of several) used to equallize the pressure slowly between the inner and out pane. It therefore seems probable that the injury to the passenger MAY have been due to a plastic ' shard '. What seems puzzling is that would require an immediate high pressure between the inner and outer pane ??? or possibly the penetration of the fuselage by a part from the engine or related structure near the top of the window ( as stated above) . Will be interesting to see photos of the outside of the plane:confused: In either case - the bit about being sucked out may NOT be supported- but a great figment of someones imagination which nowdays serves as news |
At about 5:00 minutes. NYCtr with 1380 until freq change. http://archive-server.liveatc.net/km...2018-1500Z.mp3
Then KPHL twr about 18:30 in the mp3: http://archive-server.liveatc.net/kp...2018-1500Z.mp3 Pilots sound understandably drained. |
https://i.imgur.com/iPrdD9E.jpg
makes it look like entire window inner/outer are missing "She wasn't like sucked out of the window or pulled out. But her like arms and her body were sucked, like sucked in that direction, from my vantage point. So you see people, from the back of the seat, holding onto her, you know, trying to keep her contained," Martinez told CNN. Meanwhile, other passengers were trying to patch the hole in the plane. "People in the other rows are — just trying to plug the hole, which sounds ridiculous, because you know people are using jackets and things, and it's just being sucked right out," she told CNN. on a side note, did anyone notice that none of the pax were wearing the Ox mask correctly? https://scontent-mia3-1.xx.fbcdn.net...96&oe=5B68ED6E |
Engine Cowling loss becoming a habitual event?
Pix prove this is not SLF's overworked imagination ...
If this occurs too frequently, sooner or later an engine will ingest some bits and pieces of cowling orthe fasteners and then it will be a case of uncontained engine failure. https://edition.cnn.com/2018/04/17/u...ing/index.html Edmund UPDATE: One fatality. Maybe this wasn't altogether a "minor" incident. https://nypost.com/2018/04/17/southw...ine-explosion/ |
JUST IN- ONE PERSON DIED ...
news/cnn-national/live-ntsb-holds-press-conference-on-southwest-airlines-flight/730881781 https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/sou...ght-emergency/ |
Originally Posted by brika
(Post 10121680)
Coincidence that it is Southwest again (August 2016)? How old is the aircraft? Maintenance issues?? Quality issues???
The previous (similar) Southwest Event was attributed to metal fatigue of the fan blade root. Supposedly they implemented new inspection requirements of the fan blades after that. Assuming this is another fan blade release (and it rather looks like it), I'm sure the attention will be on the heritage of this fan blade - what commonality is there with the previous event blade (e.g. made at about the same time) and at how the fan blade inspections are being performed. Oh, and before people get too overly excited about two similar events - while it is certainly worrisome that both events occurred to the same operator, the CFM56-7 has accumulated roughly 50 million flight hours since the August 2016 event. One fan blade failure every 50 million hours isn't good, but it's not horrible either... |
Originally Posted by India Four Two
(Post 10121628)
From the CNN link above:
My bold. Is this the best CNN can do in terms of an “aviation analyst”? :ugh: On the other hand, I highly recommend reading (United Airlines) Flight 232: A Story of Disaster and Survival, by Laurence Gonzales et al for in-depth reporting on a fan blade failure, what caused the failure, why it was not predicted or detected in advance (the underlying fault had existed in that blade for almost 2 decades before the catastrophe), and the effects that it had on people. While many of us know the details of that DC-10 flight in 1989 over Iowa and its heroic crew, this newer book goes much deeper into how one piece of titanium alloy changed so much. |
Gotta put the Facebooker who took a video of himself with the O2 mask over his mouth up for a Darwin Award! Nice job!
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What a scary incident but, tragic as one death is, this seems to impress on me the resilience of modern aircraft. Surely a similar failure in the 70's/80's would have bought the aircraft down?
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VinRouge,
a single HP turbine blade has the same Kinetic energy as a 20mm round if it separates at the root. Takes a lot of containment to keep it all in, plus to keep a massively unbalanced core from shaking itself to bits, even if the FADEC catches it and commands an auto shutdown. |
The damaged cowl suggests a blade out event, but we just don't know for sure.
Not so long ago considered a rare event, uncontained engine failures seem to be happening with more regularity. The technology is mature, so maintenance inspection procedures and manufacturing QC would appear to be the first places to start looking for problems. |
Originally Posted by caevans
(Post 10121775)
Gotta put the Facebooker who took a video of himself with the O2 mask over his mouth up for a Darwin Award! Nice job!
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The FAA funded a study of actual in-service events in the 90's to statistically evaluate the forward and aft trajectories of uncontained rotor engine parts. The greatest spread was seen to be fan blade particles with the outer panels often going forward into the soft inlet cowling and the innermost panels of blades going aftward if they did manage to escape through the engine casing.
However, it's not clear at this time whether the reported aircraft damage was caused by engine blade particles or release of aircraft cowling particles. In this latest incident the degree of visible damage to the engine core cowls seem to be much greater than the earlier event pictured earlier in this thread. |
Originally Posted by completely deck
(Post 10121798)
Nice job making fun of people going through an emergency from the comfort of your arm chair! It really helps in situations like this when people like you are hypercritical of normal people going through incidents.
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Originally Posted by mkenig
(Post 10121714)
At about 5:00 minutes. NYCtr with 1380 until freq change. http://archive-server.liveatc.net/km...2018-1500Z.mp3
Then KPHL twr about 18:30 in the mp3: http://archive-server.liveatc.net/kp...2018-1500Z.mp3 Pilots sound understandably drained. |
Who is the engine manufacturer? GE?
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Originally Posted by vapilot2004
(Post 10121793)
Not so long ago considered a rare event, uncontained engine failures seem to be happening with more regularity. The technology is mature, so maintenance inspection procedures and manufacturing QC would appear to be the first places to start looking for problems.
What I am concerned about is the way the fan cowls are coming apart after a fan blade release - that's not supposed to happen (and is taken into account during the design process). That didn't used to happen, and I'm at a loss as to what may have changed. |
Originally Posted by BrooksPA-28
(Post 10121676)
In the photo posted by Jet Jockey A4 the outer window shows no apparent damage. I know there is a hole in passenger windows to equalize pressure. Is it possible the window may have blown, not from "shrapnel" but as a result of the rapid decompression?
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Originally Posted by thcrozier
(Post 10121817)
Who is the engine manufacturer? GE?
IIRC, Safran is responsible for the fan on the CFM56-7. |
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