GE Probes Second Engine Failure

The failure is the second in less than two months involving a GEnx power plant from GE, the world’s biggest maker of jet engines. U.S. safety officials are probing why a GEnx component called the fan mid-shaft fractured and spewed hot metal parts during a test run of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner on July 28.

“If this is another mid-shaft failure, it places the engine and the airframes that are powered by it under a cloud,” said Robert Mann, a former American Airlines fleet manager who is now an aviation consultant in Port Washington, New York. While a single part breakdown would be seen as a “one-off,” a second on a different plane “would be a problem,” he said.

GE has finished its review of GEnx engines on the global 787 fleet, Kennedy said. About a dozen of Boeing’s four-engine 747-8 freighters remain to be checked, he said. The data are being shared with the National Transportation Safety Board as that agency investigates the Dreamliner case.

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