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B787 engine failures disrupt All Nippon Airways
September 2nd 2016
Japan’s All Nippon Airways (ANA) has taken delivery of its 50th B787. The Star Alliance member is the largest operator of the type and, until now, its senior executives only had praise for the aircraft. Read More » ANA’s CEO, Osamu Shinobe, earlier this year told Orient Aviation he was “more than satisfied” with the performance of the aircraft, and said it had 99.6% dispatch reliability. Last week, ANA’s senior vice-president for the Americas, Hideki Kunugi, said the airline was reaping huge savings from operating the Dreamliner. "Compared with the B767, ANA saves $98 million a year to operate [the B787]," he said, adding that ANA’s B787 flights to Seattle and San Jose would be unprofitable if operated by the B767.
Fast forward a week and the situation has taken an unexpected turn. The airline has revealed that turbine blade corrosion is causing engine failures on some of its Dreamliners and has forced ANA to ground six aircraft and cancel 18 flights in August. The problem has produced an 82 million yen ($800,000) revenue loss.
The first incident took place in February on a Kuala Lumpur-Narita flight and the second in March from Hanoi to Haneda. The next incident was on August 25, on flight NH241 from Haneda to Fukuoka, and the aircraft was forced to return to Tokyo’s downtown airport.
On Tuesday, an ANA B787-8 bound for Mumbai from Narita, with 68 passengers and crew on board, reported engine vibrations. The aircraft returned to Japan. Japan's Ministry of Transport confirmed there were increased engine vibrations although no internal damage had been detected to date.
“We identified the cause of these failures as erosion and cracking of the turbine blade of the engine. ANA is continuously receiving information from Rolls-Royce, which is investigating these issues. ANA said multiple engines needed to be serviced, “so we cancelled some flights for the servicing”, Japan’s largest international airline told Orient Aviation. On Wednesday, ANA confirmed it would replace all 100 engines on its Dreamliner fleet and that Rolls-Royce was developing a new type of blade for the Trent 1000 that would be ready by year-end.
"It is an issue, but it's a manageable issue," Rolls-Royce CEO, Warren East, told Reuters on Tuesday. "With the more intensive use [at ANA], the natural wear and tear on the engines happens sooner," he said. ANA has another 33 B787 variants on order from Boeing. The alternative power plant for the Dreamliner is General Electric's GEnx engine.
