United Airlines Flight 328, a Boeing 777-200 bound for Honolulu suffered from a right engine failure shortly after takeoff on Saturday. When the passenger set reached an altitude of 13,000 feet, passengers reported a loud boom coming from outside the airplane. After noticing the engine failure, the passenger jet turned around and landed safely in Denver International Airport. However, in a residential area of Broomfield, Colorado, debris began raining down onto fields, streets, and front yards. Thankfully, no injuries were reported neither from the passengers nor the residents on the ground.
Following this incident, the FAA is now conducting investigations of 128 Boeing 777 aircraft with Pratt & Whitney 4000-112 engines. Boeing also recommends the grounding of all these jets, which are now suspended and awaiting inspections. This includes 69 in-service aircraft as well as 59 aircraft that were already in storage from lack of demand. This grounding affected airlines in the US, South Korea, and Japan: United Airlines, Korean Air, Asiana Airlines, All Nippon Airways and Japan Airlines.
Analysts have described the incident as an "uncontained engine failure," a very rare, but very dangerous, occurrence. The engine failure could spread the damage onto the rest of the plane, which could lead to very disastrous consequences, although that fortunately did not happen in this recent incident. However, analysts have still noticed disturbing similarities between the recent engine failure and a different engine failure of a Boeing 777 on a United Airlines flight in February 2018.
Boeing had recently been recovering from a 18-month grounding of the 737 Max due to two tragic accidents only 5 months apart. Additionally, safety regulations and travel restrictions in response to the pandemic have led to the struggle of the airline industry. And now, according to cnn.com, Boeing is facing a "more serious long-term threat to the company than the Max grounding," Richard Aboulafia, a Teal Group aerospace analyst, says. Airbus, a Europe-based aerospace company, is competing with Boeing in a heightening rivalry in the single-aisle plane market. The rising demand for single-aisle planes rather than widebody jets are posing as an issue of concern" to the "widebody market."
In my opinion, this series of events for Boeing are slightly indicating another potential bailout by Congress. Do you agree that there is this possibility? And is this bailout for Boeing justified, especially due to the effect of Covid-19 on airline industries? Is Boeing in need of help, or should the company suffer the consequences?
Is the grounding of Boeing 777 aircraft with the same type as engine as the recent Denver incident justified?
No comments:
Post a Comment