Southwest Flight 1380, which took off from New York for Dallas, Texas, with 144 passengers and five crew members aboard, made an emergency landing in Philadelphia on Tuesday after an engine on the plane ripped apart, killing bank executive Jennifer Riordan, 43. PHILADELPHIA (AP) - A preliminary examination of the blown jet engine of the Southwest Airlines plane that set off a terrifying chain of events and left a businesswoman hanging half outside a shattered window showed evidence of "metal fatigue," according to the National Transportation Safety Board. Airlines said that because fan blades may have been repaired and moved to other engines, the order would affect far more than 220 of the CFM56-7Bs, which are made by a partnership of France's Safran and General Electric. The order, which it initially proposed in August following an engine failure in 2016 on another Southwest Airlines Co flight, will require ultrasonic inspection within the next six months of fan blades on all CFM56-7B engines that have accrued a certain number of takeoffs, while others will need inspections within 18 months. NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt said on Tuesday at the Philadelphia airport that a preliminary investigation found an engine fan blade missing, having apparently broken off, and that there was metal fatigue at the point where it would normally be attached. PARIS: US Federal Aviation Administration said on Wednesday that it would order the inspection of 220 jet engines after investigators said a broken fan blade was the cause of an engine explosion on a Southwest Airlines flight that shattered a window and killed a passenger.
The United States National Transportation Safety Board declares metal fatigue caused a fan blade failure that killed a passenger on April 16, the same issue behind a similar accident on another Southwest Airlines Boeing 737 in 2016. The Federal Aviation Administration announces mandatory ultrasonic inspections on fan blades fitted to CFM56-7B engines of which around 8,000 are flying worldwide.