A350 Engine Fire Prompts Mandatory EASA Airplane Inspections

The Airbus A350-1000 has become a cause for concern for Hong Kong's flag carrier Cathay Pacific. Rampant problems with the aircraft's Rolls-Royce engines are now set to face a through investigation by the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA).

The Little Engine That Could (Pose A Risk)

EASA has made a statement on Thursday that it will take a trip to Hong Kong to inspect as many as 48 A350 wide-body jets for potential engine problems. Rolls-Royce, the engine's manufacturer based in England, will also “work very closely with EASA for the duration of the inspector.”

Depending on the conditions of each aircraft's turbofan, the inspections will each last as short as three days, but could be extended to as long as 30 days. The fleet includes A350-1000 models that contain Rolls-Royce Trent XWB-97 engines. These both the A350-1000 and A350-900 models make up 15% of the collection of A350s in Cathay's fleet.

This is a follow-up report of Cathay Pacific announcing it will ground all of its 48 A350s following an "engine component failure" that occurred on flight CX383 that was scheduled to fly to Zurich, Switzerland. Shortly after takeoff, the plane returned to Hong Kong International Airport.

EASA also notes that the aircraft in question also suffered an engine fire due to a "failure of a hose in the furl system", but airport crews were quick to douse the fire. Cathay Pacific's own investigations revealed there was leak in the furl injection nozzle, but did not state whether this was the main problem or the result of it. This problem appears to stem from the A350-1000 model and not have an effect on the older A350-900.

EASA Executive Director Florian Guillermet had the following statement on the ongoing investigation:

"This action is a precautionary measure, based on the information received from the initial investigation of the recent Cathay Pacific serious incident and on the airline’s findings in its own subsequent inspections ... We will continue to follow closely all information that will be made available through the ongoing safety investigation.”

As a result of these jets being grounded for inspection, dozens of flights have been cancelled over the past week, leading to affected travelers having to ask for refunds or their flights to be rescheduled.

However, this was the right call from the airline, as it found that 15 of these A350-1000s require new engine components. These planes will reportedly be ready for takeoff again on Saturday.

Other Airlines Follow Suit

This news became a cause for concern to other airlines. Following the lead of Cathay Pacific, a handful of other airlines also conducted their own tests for their A350 fleets. 
 

A Japan Airlines spokesperson stated that "no issues were found on any aircraft". As a result, the airline hasn't delayed or cancelled any flight thus far, but EASA and Rolls-Royce will need to lead additional inspections to ensure the engines are all safe for travel. Japan Airlines currently has 18 A350s in its fleet.

Qatar Airways has 58 A350s in its fleet. The airline states they will inspect the 24 A360 1000s following directives from EASA and Rolls-Royce.

Etihad Airways from UAE has five A350-1000s. While it too took the Cathay story seriously and conducted an investigation, it hasn't found any engine problems thus far.

Virgin Atlantic has 12 A350-1000s, stating that the directives from the two entities will cause "minimal disruptions" for air travel.

Delta Air Lines, Thai Airways, Singapore Airlines, and Air China are among the airlines that only have A350-900 aircrafts, and have yet to receive the newer model. So far, none of these airlines have found engine problems.

The first A350-1000 aircraft was delivered to Qatar Airways on February 20, 2018, so its a fairly new model of plane and many airlines have received these planes fairly recently in order for known problems to be identified. It's very fortunate that nobody on the flight to Zurich was hurt. A month of inspections can go a long way to ensure a long service time for these incredible, wide-body jets.

What do you think of these new A350-1000 developments? Let us know in the comments section below.