Crew did a great job, probably a good thing the captain had fighter experience to know how to breathe during the explosive decompression event. Very sad a passenger lost her life--prayers for her and her family. Pretty early to blame "missed or improper inspection". We blamed UA 232 on improper inspection based on finding residue of fluorescent penetrant vaporized from the crack surface of the disc remnant. This became the foundation of "human factors" in nondestructive examination (NDE), i.e., although we have vast amounts of technical data instructing the human to carefully inspect the center bore area of the disc, we still missed the crack 800 hours earlier during maintenance--which to this day I believe is BS but full disclosure--my father worked for UAL for about 43 years. Later we learned the same chemical is also found in turbine engine oil--wow, that's really strange that turbine engine oil might be found on a turbine engine part in an area near a rotating air/oil se

(Written on 04/18/2018)(Permalink)

That ain't "just a cowling". Looks like the fan and compressor too. Pretty serious failure.

(Written on 02/17/2018)(Permalink)

Thought I heard a report that the front tire blew and pieces were ingested in an engine. A dragging bearing could cause the tire to overheat and fail during the takeoff roll. If that happened at rotation, it could explain the abort and hard smash to the nose gear and although the airplane is certified to be able to take off on one engine at that point, why chance a go around if you can park it? FDR should be helpful in sorting events here.

(Written on 03/15/2014)(Permalink)

How do you say "Oh s*it" in Koregian?

(Written on 07/09/2013)(Permalink)

This looks like a late stage compressor blade failure. Uncontained blade release, no damage to A/C, engine shutdown and air return with safe landing. Crew had a few exciting moments but overall no big deal except the cost of repair. Old A/C does not equate to old engine--I think I saw this bird land in PHX in 1989, it was cool as you can get pretty close at Sky Harbor. At the time of UA232 the thinking was that rotating parts were designed with a safe life and no inspection would be required. This has changed since to inspect at each opportunity.

(Written on 11/03/2011)(Permalink)

You're not going to be able to contain fracture/failure of a rotating component like UA 232 (Sioux City) even with a Kevlar nacelle. This was the result of metallurgical defects in the fan disk, they blamed UA maintenance but the cause was the defect in the fan disk. Turbine blade failures are by regulation required to be contained by engine design or shown to pose no threat to the A/C in flight. Fan blades are critical engine parts though.

(Written on 11/03/2011)(Permalink)

A long "emergency" checklist with a short time to do it is a really bad idea. I believe I read one of the reasons the Qantas A380 flew for an hour and a half while leaking fuel after the uncontained turbine rotor failure that severely damaged wing structure was because the crew had to clear hundreds of computer squaks to allow the plane to LAND!

(Written on 04/29/2011)(Permalink)

I believe Wright is supposed to go away this year? The irony of this is described this week in an article in Aviation Week--the FAA was trumpeting all the work done over the past 20 years relative to aging aircraft resulting from the Aloha 737 failure when the SWA roof blew. The SWA 737 barely qualifies as an "aging" aircraft at 15 years but this probably will be changing (as it should) unless these incidents are positively determined to be something other than undetected cracking which would indicate inadequate inspection intervals.

(Written on 04/15/2011)(Permalink)

This is part of the reason why your 210 gets an annual inspection! Hard to compare a 210 to a 737 to an F-15. I live in MO where the ANG F-15 broke up in flight and was not aware of more than one inflight breakup--this one got everyone's attention and the problem was fixed. The problem with aircraft is that the safety factor is low to keep weight down compared to things like say highway bridges. Throw in hard landings, weather, turbulence, and "the real world" and even the best design can be compromised. This is why we perform inspections on a scheduled interval--the idea is to find and fix things before they become hazardous. Some fatigue critical parts have mandatory retirement limits based on hours or cycles in service. As an industry we have evidently failed to detect hazardous cracking in at least two SWA 737s and one AA 757. The question now is why--shortened inspection intervals are prudent until more information is known--then there will probably be airworthiness dire

(Written on 04/15/2011)(Permalink)

Former NTSB member and long time airline mechanic John Golia put it best in an interview on FoxNews shortly after the failure--paraphrasing he said, "We saw a small hole in a 737 in 2009, now we have a big hole, and the next one may be a smoking hole. The airplane is trying to tell us something". The interview was in the "outsourced maintenance to El Salvador" vein (which evidently did not occur with this aircraft) but John's comments are spot on. I would think if there is a serious error in life estimation it would be seen in the airframe accelerated fatigue test articles. It's not like this is a new structure from a design standpoint. Metallurgical analysis should identify the actual cause of the failure which should be compared to the 2009 incident. Operating history and manufacturing records for the particular aircraft involved should also be reviewed.

(Written on 04/15/2011)(Permalink)