India Probing 3 Cases of Mid-Flight Engine Shutdowns in Last 2 Months: Report

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India is investigating three cases in the past two months where pilots had to turn off the aircraft engines mid-flight. The engines involved in all three incidents were manufactured by a joint venture of General Electric (GE) Co, a report stated.

The "command in-flight shutdowns" require pilots to intentionally switch of one of the plane's engines if a problem occurs. In these three cases, the problems may have been caused by different factors, Bloomberg quoted people familiar with the matter as saying.

The engines involved in all three incidents were owned by CFM, which is a joint venture between GE and Safran SA.

Incidents Involved SpiceJet, Air India Flights

The aircrafts involved were two Airbus SE A320neo planes, operated by Air India, and a Boeing Co 737 Max, operated by SpiceJet.

This comes as CFM is scheduled to supply engines to Indigo. The company is also considering opening a repair facility in India, especially after it got the deal from Indigo, marking its largest order yet.

Safran is also working with GE on manufacturing technology that could see an engine's blades operating without a traditional casing, as per Bloomberg.

However, recent issues might raise CFM's warranty costs.

In a recent incident of apparent engine failure, an Air India flight, which was flying from Mumbai to Bengaluru, returned to Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport just 27 minutes after it had taken off due to one of its engines shutting down mid-air owing to a technical fault.

The passengers were then flown to their destination Bengaluru after switching aircrafts, officials said.

(With inputs from Bloomberg.)