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In the case of a contained engine failure, don’t planes immediately land at the closest safe location? Passengers would definitely know.
by oivey 6y ago
In the case of a contained engine failure, don’t planes immediately land at the closest safe location? Passengers would definitely know.
- TylerE 6y agoUsually, but that can be very far way. Look up ETOPS.
- crote 6y agoIt depends. The Denver one [0] basically landed straight away at the same airport 40 minutes later. The Maastricht one [1] circled around for an hour, and landed on a completely different airport. The whole "immediate" and "closest" is relative. Strange as it may seem, an engine failure isn't that big of a deal: the aircraft is designed to fly for hours while missing an engine. However, the aircraft is now in a bit of an unknown state. The pilots need time to work through their checklists, determining what the exact impact is. The airplane might be leaking fuel; it might've lost a set of hydraulics; maybe it's on fire; maybe the engine can be restarted and everything is fine. Landing as soon as possible at the closest safe location might turn out to be hours later and hundreds of miles away, perhaps even at your destination airport! [0]: https://uk.flightaware.com/live/flight/UAL328/history/20210220/1925Z/KDEN/PHNL https://uk.flightaware.com/live/flight/UAL328/history/202102... [1]: https://uk.flightaware.com/live/flight/LGT5504/history/20210220/1525Z/EHBK/EBLG https://uk.flightaware.com/live/flight/LGT5504/history/20210...
- oivey 6y agoThe point was often the plane would land somewhere that isn’t their destination, which would at least clue them into the fact that there was some significant mechanical issue.