Yesterday’s Philippine Airlines Los Angeles – Manila flight declared a mayday and returned to the airport with its right engine releasing bursts of flames. The Boeing 777-300 was carrying 342 passengers and 18 crew. It was in its initial climb out when the right engine began surging. It returned to the same runway it had departed from 12 minutes earlier.
You can see the right engine surges on the Boeing 777 in this video taken by a passenger from inside the aircraft.
Here’s video of the aircraft from the ground, showing the smoking engine.
Lucky lucky lucky it happened when it did. And not later inflight.
@alliw – yeah, makes life easier. But that’s what the “E” in ETOPS is is for.
@CW right?! He should have circled and dumped fuel and not caused a huge repair bill on the landing gear…
@CW and @ Steve S
Are you both really going to argue he could have taken his sweet time and saved money on repairing landing gear? ETOPS is great and i myself feel more comfortable knowing it is established and we can make it a long ways with just one engine. BUT ETOPS is there for when you absolutely need it. it is not just a “feature” for you to rely on.
The article indicates they had been in the air just 12 minutes…. With uncertainty as to what exactly is going on, in my opinion the smartest thing to do was to turn back immediately.
FVCK YOUR LANDING GEAR!
@Steve S: There is no “huge repair bill” on the landing gear, only an inspection for a (presumed) overweight landing. Also there is the environmental impact of dumping fuel – so it is done only if required.
scary glad all are safe what type of plane was it??
My post wasn’t about landing gear. It was just preempting any “We’re all gonna die!!!” type posts. That’s all.
Let’s see. Engine spewing flames, and we’re going to dump fuel and make a huge mist cloud of the fuel …
doesn’t seem like a good idea to dump fuel in this situation.