British Airways A319 lands minus engine cowlings

British Airways flight 762 departed to Oslo this morning, and returned shortly after, with a "technical fault". Upon landing crews realized that both engine cowlings were missing, and the number two engine (right side) showed smoke damage behind where the cowling should have been.

Since 2000 Airbus has identified 18 cowling loss incidents, 13 of which were on similar V2500 engine types. They have been reluctant to pursue a warning system for pilots and have instead looked at simple ideas such as fluorescent paint to identify a gap in the cowling after maintenance (Airbus says most of the incidents have come after maintenance failed to secure the cowlings properly).

UK investigators have opened an inquiry into the British Airways Airbus A319 incident at London Heathrow which resulted in substantial damage to both engines.

Images show that the fan cowl doors on both engines have been torn away, with clear discolouration on the rear of the starboard International Aero Engines V2500 powerplant.

The UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch says it has started a probe into the event involving the aircraft (G-EUOE) which had just taken off as flight BA762 to Oslo.

www.flightglobal.com...

Originally posted by Zaphod58
Since 2000 Airbus has identified 18 cowling loss incidents,

Images show that the fan cowl doors on both engines have been torn away

So... something like this then. Said to be an Airbus A320.
link

reply to post by alfa1


Pretty much exactly like that. The entire mid engine cowling was ripped off on both engines. The right engine had discoloration on the aft section as well.

It appears that there was an explosion in the right engine that caused it to catch fire. There was no problem of any kind of technical problem relating to the left engine, except that the cowling came off.

www.dailymail.co.uk...

Any ideas what may have caused the explosion ? Bird strike maybe. My understanding is that the cowling didn't come off until it was close to the airport. I saw footage of the plane when it was coming into land with a light smoke plume coming from the engine

Edit: oops re read the information .. It happened shortly after take off ? I would of thought the plane would turn back to Oslo


Second edit: re re read the information .. It was departing TO Oslo sorry my mix up its only 6am here in the uk I've just got to work and woke up 20 mins ago .. Ignore me

Aside from why this happened, surely the biggest question is where did the casings land?? London is incredibly heavily populated and I really wouldn't want one of those landing through my roof...

reply to post by Florasaurus


I did think about this too but I haven't heard any reports of people finding any wreckage .. Maybe when it comes to a farmer ploughing their field they might find it. Scary thought though

Edit: off topic and merely just rambling on .. Been here almost 3 years I think it's about time to make an avatar for myself

It's been reported as a bird strike now.

reply to post by moonrunner


The right engine may have started as a bird strike, but there are pictures of both engine cowlings missing, and bird strikes don't do that.

reply to post by Zaphod58


Yeah, and the pilots are saying it wasn't a bird strike. Both cowlings sound wrong to me.

Any chance the right engine inhaled its cowling?

reply to post by Bedlam


Theoretically it's possible that a small piece of it went under the aircraft, but really unlikely, because the cowling came off the center portion of the engine, behind the ring cowl. My bet is on maintenance performed recently, and the "maintenance complete" checklist wasn't followed properly and at least one clip wasn't secured properly, so it looked like it was secured, but wasn't completely.

reply to post by Zaphod58


Anything under the cowling that could have been damaged when the cowling tore away? It sort of looks like the fire was outside the engine in the cowling area. Hard to tell though.

reply to post by Bedlam


There are some areas inside the engine that can have fires if damaged by the cowling coming off. The only C-135 we ever saw come back with a fire warning light, that was actually on fire, had a problem with the hydraulic pump that led to it catching fire and burning through the engine cowling. It's possible that one of the hydraulic pumps was damaged by a piece of cowling, and it caught fire. Hydraulic fluid tends to go up pretty easily, and it burns hot enough that it can catch other things around it on fire pretty easily.

Originally posted by Bedlam
reply to post by Zaphod58

 

Anything under the cowling that could have been damaged when the cowling tore away?

Yes, FADEC (engine control), fuel or oil lines or the oil cooler.

There are several failure modes possible caused by the engine cowling.

Someone got a video of an engine in flight at landing.



www.youtube.com...

I'm going out on a limb and say - whoever replaced the cowlings did it wrong (probably accidentally) in a systematic way. Both let go. And on one side, it took something with it you'd rather have intact, perhaps it damaged some engine control which then caused subsequent internal damage to the engine, or it ripped something flammable loose and the fire was all on the outside in the cowling area.

reply to post by Bedlam


That's what I'm thinking too. Airbus has blamed just about all 13 events on maintenance problems related to working on the engines. There have been seven in the last 5 or 6 years IIRC.

Well here's a surprise. The AAIB has found that after maintenance on the aircraft the engine cowlings were left unlatched. What they didn't say before was that the aircraft suffered pretty significant damage. When the right cowling ripped off it punctured a fuel line and hydraulic line, causing the fire. The crew initially declared a PAN, but when the fire started they upgraded to a Mayday.

Subsequent inspection of the aircraft revealed damage to the inboard leading edge slats, inboard flaps, fuselage skin on both sides, left horizontal stabilizer leading edge, and several aircraft fairings.

www.flightglobal.com...

reply to post by Zaphod58


According to a news report last night, some of the debris also caused a tyre to let go as the aircraft was landing.

reply to post by solidshot


I'm not surprised. They talked about debris hitting around the wheel well. It sounds like the plane will be down for a good long while.