Holy Engine Problems, Batman

Accidents/Incidents, CRJ, Mesa Airlines

And now for a brief lesson on aircraft engines.

This is what a GE CF34-3B1 engine on a Mesa Airlines CRJ in America West Express colors is supposed to look like.

hpxcrjengine

Now, here’s a picture of that same type of engine after a flight from Denver to Phoenix last Thursday.

hpxcrjblown

Now, only the most detail-oriented people will be able to spot the difference. Can you see it? Yup, that’s right, the engine on the bottom is SHREDDED! Not freaky enough? How about this side view:

hpxenginecomp

According to Flightglobal.com, this apparently happened on a Mesa Airlines flight operating as US Airways Express last Thursday. The flight left Denver and about 50 miles out had a, um, minor problem when it “shed a fan blade and the forward cowling from its left engine.”

The flight turned around and landed without any problems, but this picture is fairly disturbing. This is the first problem of its kind for this type of engine, so it will be interesting to see what they uncover.

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1 comment on “Holy Engine Problems, Batman

  1. this is not the first event on this engine type in fact all operators of the GE CF34-3 engine know all too well about the issues revolving around the fan disk departure.

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