In 2018, another United Airlines Boeing 777
suffered an engine failure that caused parts of
the housing to break off and fall into the Pacific
Ocean as the plane flew from San Francisco to
Honolulu. In a report last year on the incident,
the NTSB said Pratt & Whitney missed signs
of cracking in previous inspections of the fan
blade that broke, and it faulted the company’s
training. The company told the NTSB it was
fixing the shortcomings.
WILL THIS HURT BOEING?
Cai von Rumohr, an aviation analyst with
Cowen, said events around Saturday’s flight will
be a bigger issue for Pratt & Whitney’s parent
company, Raytheon, than for Boeing. Still, he
said, it’s “probably not a major negative” for
Raytheon because it affects a relatively small
number of planes and the engines have been
used for many years.
Other experts said Boeing could be in the spotlight
too as investigators look into why the cowling
separated from the engine. “That cowling is a
Boeing design, it’s not the engine manufacturer’s
design,” said Jeff Guzzetti, former director of the
FAA’s accident investigation division.
Boeing’s reputation has been battered since
2018 by two deadly crashes of another plane,
the 737 Max.