United 328

A guy found some stuff in his yard.




This guy lost some stuff..




Not sure who was luckiest...
Definitely some people in need of fresh underwear.

a reply to: Bluntone22

Did I miss something? What the hell happened?

Trying to find out how long it flew like that for.

Linky?

I'd love to know what happened too, some internal failure I guess. I thought initially it was going to be a bird strike but the fan is still in one piece as far as I can tell.

originally posted by: KKLOCO
a reply to: Bluntone22

Did I miss something? What the hell happened?

Trying to find out how long it flew like that for.

Linky?

a reply to: KKLOCO

Engine failure shortly after takeoff. Still on climb out north and west of the airport. Hadn't even made it to the front range yet.

Flight returned safely to DEN without further incident.

ETA - They were probably just past the Denver Departure / Center handoff point, and had likely just throttled up for their initial climb out to intermediate altitude. If something was going to happen, better there than 2-3 minutes before that point. Then the story might not have had as happy of an ending.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Thank you! If anyone were to know, it would be you.

a reply to: Bluntone22

😥
Gorilla Glue and a new cowling should fix that.

I suppose it's still too early to know exactly what happened but it's pretty spectacular that it blew the entire fairing off of the engine.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
a reply to: KKLOCO

Engine failure shortly after takeoff. Still on climb out north and west of the airport. Hadn't even made it to the front range yet.

Flight returned safely to DEN without further incident.

ETA - They were probably just past the Denver Departure / Center handoff point, and had likely just throttled up for their initial climb out to intermediate altitude. If something was going to happen, better there than 2-3 minutes before that point. Then the story might not have had as happy of an ending.

a reply to: KKLOCO

The 777-200 airframe has got some time on it, not a spring chicken by any means.

They were really close to the airport though...almost too close. Problems like these are things you train for, but failures at transition points are always more challenging than in normal flight (with lots of altitude).

originally posted by: KKLOCO
a reply to: Bluntone22

Did I miss something? What the hell happened?

Trying to find out how long it flew like that for.

Linky?

www.cnn.com...

a reply to: Morbidlynx

Basically blew most of the nacelle cowling away, but it doesn't appear to be an uncontained turbine failure because the N1 rotor is still spinning (at least at the front...just wind milling though). Maybe the N1 shaft sheared and fragged the N2 turbine/compressor, but that's just a half assed guess. Zaphod will have a better assessment than I do.

ETA - Blowing that honeycomb cowling apart like that took some serious explosive force! That stuff does not break easily.

Did the rubber band that holds that cover on break? They do get brittle with cold and age.

Nice job putting it back on the ground.

a reply to: beyondknowledge

Well, I assume your post is tongue-in-cheek. There are no rubber bands, and the latches and structure are actually very secure. I can almost assure you, this was not a cowling failure.

Do they get brittle in cold? Wow, I imagine somewhat, but if you've ever seen how strong one of these parts is it can't be much.

Composites, metal alloys, relatively light materials, perhaps made this event thankfully, non-fatal on the ground.

The engine itself seems well out of balance, because it had lost it's dynamic streamlining structures, but still rotating seemingly unpowered in the airflow nevertheless. Birdstrike or drone or what?



I also found this still from the engine video that appears to show an anomaly in the fan blade structure.



files.abovetopsecret.com...

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

I would think that the cold wouldn’t greatly effect them considering how cold it is at cruise altitude.

For the record...pilot and crew did a fantastic job landing the aircraft. It's very windy today, and this adds to the difficulty.

I'm sure they were likely given the best, easiest, runway for their situation, and given the winds today this was likely 16R/34L. It's also the longest runway, so less braking to stop. I don't know what runways were active at the time right now, so it could have been different.

a reply to: Bluntone22

Exactly, the temps they were at are pretty close to surface temps (minus a few degrees). Probably around zero where they were vs. 22-ish here. Not a biggie at all really.

Minuse -50F is maybe a bit different, but even then it doesn't have a whole lot of effect on modern airliners.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk
It is strange what will take an airplane down sometimes. A bad repair on a DC10 thrust reverser wear strip destroyed a Concorde and eventually grounded the entire fleet permanently.

a reply to: smurfy

No, no bird strike caused that, at least not in my opinion. A bird strike will stall a turbine, but it doesn't generally explode like that.

The "out of balance" you see is...anything off of that engine is going to cause an imbalance (i.e. a fairing, a panel, etc). All that engine was on the wing was a great big old drag on performance. And, this is one of the great things about the 777, the "triple 7". It was made with two giant engines, each of which are capable of flying the aircraft.

I've never measured it for myself, but I've heard that a DC-7 fuselage will fit inside the nacelle of a Boeing 777 engine.

That's BIG!!

P.S. - I see these guys on the ground all the time and when you walk up next to one, especially the engines, they're massive!

Okay...well, I'm done.

I gave y'all everything I know.

Enjoy your night.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

They were with departure, and had just gotten a PIREP about turbulence from 14-22, and had been cleared to 23.