I can’t believe nobody posted anything about this. I guess the story goes something like this:
Pilot & crew thought the plane was vibrating way too much, so they wrote in the log that it was reccommended to put the aircraft in maintenance. Next pilot read the log and made the call to put it in maintenance. Well, i guess when they took it to the maintenance area and did a run up on the engines, when it was about 80%, the right engine had a piece fly out of it, through the fuselage, and into the left engine. The left engine had some pretty good damage and there was damage to the wing and started leaking fuel. Obviously, the fuel ignited and pretty much one side of the plane was scorced pretty good.
Pictures are pretty cool. I am going to have my FIL forward me the email and see if I can get a few on here.
I think this is the one you’re talking about…it was a 767.
About half-way down this thread there are a few very detailed shots of the engine and the damge.
http://www.airliners.net/discussions/general_aviation/read.main/2803942/
…couldve been MUCH worse. i.e. with people and a load a fuel onboard. Heaven forbid if it occured in flight…not good.
How the hell did I miss that with the search??? Oh well…
Edit: OOPS…wrong thread, wrong website. That would explain it. Those are some of the pics I saw. I agree, better on the ground than in the air. Also, don’t think the pilot who grounded the plane will have to do much explaining with the chief pilot. I think he and the second pilot should get a safety bonus for it.
Now that I think of it, what do you think the wonderful media of ours would have done if it went kaboom in midflight? I am willing to bet that the first words out of their mouths would be something pertaining to terrorists!
There are pictures here: flickr.com/photos/lafd/sets/ … 153722446/
I read somewhere that this may have been caused by an engine overspeed during the maintenance check (I just can’t remember where I read that). It’s pretty dramatic to see a high pressure turbine gone from the engine…broke the low pressure system shaft - that’s a lot of energy being released!
