British Airways Flight 2276 was a scheduled international passenger service from
Las Vegas
Las Vegas (; Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known simply as Vegas, is the 25th-most populous city in the United States, the most populous city in the state of Nevada, and the county seat of Clark County. The city anchors the Las Vegas ...
to
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
. On 8 September 2015, the
Boeing 777-200ER
The Boeing 777, commonly referred to as the Triple Seven, is an American long-range wide-body airliner developed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. It is the world's largest twinjet.
The 777 was designed to bridge the gap betw ...
operating the flight suffered an
uncontained engine failure
A turbine engine failure occurs when a turbine engine unexpectedly stops producing power due to a malfunction other than fuel exhaustion. It often applies for aircraft, but other turbine engines can fail, like ground-based turbines used in power ...
and fire in the left (
#1)
GE90
The General Electric GE90 is a family of high-bypass turbofan aircraft engines built by GE Aviation for the Boeing 777, with thrust ratings from . It entered service with British Airways in November 1995. It is one of three options for the 777 ...
engine during take-off from
Las Vegas-McCarran International Airport, prompting an
aborted take-off and the evacuation of all passengers and crew. All 170 people on board survived, but 20 were injured.
The aircraft, which suffered moderate damage to a section of its forward fuselage as of a result of the vigorous fire, was repaired and returned to commercial passenger service in March 2016.
The fire was caused by metal fatigue in a compressor disk, leading to detachment of the main fuel supply line.
Incident
![BA2276 Fuselage](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/BA2276_Fuselage.jpg)
The aircraft left Terminal 3, Gate E3, at 15:53 local time, and began its take-off from Runway 07L at 16:12 where the incident occurred.
After noticing what the pilot later described as a "catastrophic failure of the engine"
well before take-off speed, the flight crew
aborted the take-off by using the aircraft's brakes and ordered an evacuation of the aircraft. All 170 passengers and crew escaped. Nineteen people sustained minor injuries and one person sustained serious injuries.
The aircraft is thought to have reached a speed of approximately when the decision to abort was made; far below the
takeoff decision speed of the aircraft, which would have been at least .
The airport's emergency services extinguished the fire within five minutes of the
mayday
Mayday is an emergency procedure word used internationally as a distress signal in voice-procedure radio communications.
It is used to signal a life-threatening emergency primarily by aviators and mariners, but in some countries local organiza ...
call. Fourteen people were lightly injured, mostly from sliding down the escape chutes, and treated at
Sunrise Hospital & Medical Center
Sunrise Hospital & Medical Center is a for-profit hospital owned by the Hospital Corporation of America and operated by Sunrise Healthcare System. It is located in the Las Vegas Valley in Winchester, Nevada.
History
Sunrise was founded in 1958. I ...
.
The fire caused a large hole in the cargo hold and damage to the engine.
The
Federal Aviation Administration
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is the largest transportation agency of the U.S. government and regulates all aspects of civil aviation in the country as well as over surrounding international waters. Its powers include air traffic m ...
(FAA) indicated the fire was caused by failure of the left
General Electric GE90
The General Electric GE90 is a family of high-bypass turbofan aircraft engines built by GE Aviation for the Boeing 777, with thrust ratings from . It entered service with British Airways in November 1995. It is one of three options for the 777 ...
engine, one of two fitted on the aircraft. The aircraft came to a halt upwind, causing the fire to be blown towards the fuselage; the aircraft sustained localised, but major, structural damage as a result. The aircraft was equipped with suppression systems, though the systems did not extinguish the fire.
The runway, one of four, was closed, and several inbound flights were cancelled.
Aircraft and crew
The aircraft involved in the incident was a Boeing 777-236ER, s/n 29320, registered as G-VIIO. At the time of the incident, the aircraft was 16 years old; it had been delivered new to British Airways on 26 January 1999.
The
captain
Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police department, election precinct, e ...
was 63-year-old Chris Henkey, who had been with British Airways since 1973 and received his type rating on the Boeing 777 in 1999. He had 30,000 flight hours, including 12,000 hours on the Boeing 777.
Flight 2276 was intended to be his penultimate flight before his retirement (which was intended to occur in a week),
but following the accident he decided that Flight 2276 would be his final flight.
The
first officer, 30-year-old Ian Callaghan, joined the airline in 2006, receiving his type rating on the Boeing 777 in 2011, and had 6,400 flight hours, with 3,100 hours on the Boeing 777.
45-year-old
relief pilot
In-flight crew relief (commonly referred in noun form as the relief aircrew, relief flight crew, or just relief crew), is a term used in commercial aviation when referring to the members of an aircrew intended to temporarily relieve active crew me ...
Kevin Hillyer was also on board. He had been with British Airways since 1997 and had been type rated on the Boeing 777 since 2001. The relief pilot had 14,000 flight hours, and like captain Henkey, was also well experienced on the Boeing 777 having logged 10,000 hours on it. He was a first officer at the time of the accident.
Repair
In December 2015, British Airways announced that a team of engineers from
Boeing
The Boeing Company () is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, telecommunications equipment, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and product ...
had assessed the aircraft and determined the damage was limited and suitable for repair. As a result, it was announced that the aircraft would be repaired and returned to service. A team from Boeing completed the repairs in February 2016.
Airworthiness
In aviation, airworthiness is the measure of an aircraft's suitability for safe flight. Initial airworthiness is demonstrated by a certificate of airworthiness issued by the civil aviation authority in the state in which the aircraft is register ...
tests were conducted on the aircraft on 25 February 2016. On 26 February, the aircraft made its departure from Las Vegas McCarran airport at 1:33 p.m. and was flown to
Victorville
Victorville is a city in Victor Valley in San Bernardino County, California. Its population as of the 2020 census was 134,810.
History
In 1858, Aaron G. Lane came to what is now known as Victorville and founded a waystation called "Lane's Cro ...
, arriving at 3:06 p.m, where it was repainted and further repairs and maintenance work was performed. The aircraft was then flown to British Airways Maintenance Cardiff in
Cardiff
Cardiff (; cy, Caerdydd ) is the capital and largest city of Wales. It forms a principal area, officially known as the City and County of Cardiff ( cy, Dinas a Sir Caerdydd, links=no), and the city is the eleventh-largest in the United Kingd ...
on 15 March for a routine
C check. Finally, it returned to its
London Gatwick
Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after Hea ...
base and resumed passenger service on 24 March.
Investigation
The
National Transportation Safety Board
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is an independent U.S. government investigative agency responsible for civil transportation accident investigation. In this role, the NTSB investigates and reports on aviation accidents and incid ...
(NTSB), the American air accident investigative body, dispatched four investigators to the site the day after the incident. As well as FAA, Boeing and General Electric involvement, the British
Air Accidents Investigation Branch
The Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) investigates civil aircraft accidents and serious incidents within the United Kingdom, its overseas territories and crown dependencies. It is also the Space Accident Investigation Authority (SAIA) ...
has a representative and that representative has appointed "British Airways and the
UK Civil Aviation Authority as technical advisors". Initial NTSB findings were that an uncontained engine failure had occurred and that the "left engine and pylon, left fuselage structure and inboard left wing airplane were substantially damaged by the fire".
On 6 October 2015, the NTSB issued an update stating that the accident was traced to the failure of the "stage 8–10 spool in the high-pressure compressor section...liberating fragments that breached the engine case and cowling".
The NTSB released their final report 2 years and 10 months later. The cause of the accident was determined as:
See also
*
American Airlines Flight 383 (2016)
American Airlines Flight 383 was a scheduled passenger flight from Chicago to Miami, which caught fire on the runway at Chicago O’Hare on October 28, 2016. The crew aborted their takeoff, evacuating everyone on board, of whom 21 were injure ...
- A Boeing 767-300 which caught fire at
O'Hare Airport
Chicago O'Hare International Airport , sometimes referred to as, Chicago O'Hare, or simply O'Hare, is the main international airport serving Chicago, Illinois, located on the city's Northwest Side, approximately northwest of the Loop business ...
.
*
Korean Air Flight 2708
On 27 May 2016, a Boeing 777-300 of Korean Air, operating as Korean Air Flight 2708 from Haneda Airport in Tokyo to Seoul's Gimpo International Airport, was accelerating for take off when its left engine suffered an uncontained failure and a s ...
– Another Boeing 777 that experienced an engine fire at
Haneda Airport
, officially , and sometimes called as Tokyo Haneda Airport or Haneda International Airport , is one of two international airports serving the Greater Tokyo Area, the other one being Narita International Airport (NRT). It serves as the primary ...
.
*
BOAC Flight 712
BOAC Flight 712 ( callsign ''Speedbird 712'') was a British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) service operated by a Boeing 707-465 from London Heathrow Airport bound for Sydney via Zurich and Singapore. On Monday 8 April 1968, it suffered a ...
*
British Airtours Flight 28M
British Airtours Flight 28M (also known as Flight 328) was an international passenger flight which caught fire before takeoff at Manchester Airport, England on 22 August 1985 with the loss of 55 lives. It was en route to Corfu International A ...
*
TWA Flight 843
TWA Flight 843 (TW843, TWA843) was a scheduled Trans World Airlines passenger flight that crashed after an aborted takeoff from John F. Kennedy International Airport ( New York) to San Francisco International Airport (California) in July 1992 ...
*
Saudia Flight 163
Saudia Flight 163 was a scheduled Saudia passenger flight departing from Quaid-E-Azam Airport in Karachi, Pakistan bound for Kandara Airport in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia via Riyadh International Airport in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia that caught fire aft ...
*
United Airlines Flight 328
On February 20, 2021, United Airlines Flight 328 (UA328/UAL328), a scheduled U.S. domestic passenger flight from Denver to Honolulu, suffered a contained engine failure four minutes after takeoff from Denver International Airport (DEN). ...
and
United Airlines Flight 1175
On February 13, 2018, around noon local time, a Boeing 777-222 airplane, operating as United Airlines Flight 1175 (UA1175), experienced an in-flight separation of a fan blade in the No. 2 (right) engine while over the Pacific Ocean en route to ...
, other
Boeing 777
The Boeing 777, commonly referred to as the Triple Seven, is an American long-range wide-body airliner developed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. It is the world's largest twinjet.
The 777 was designed to bridge the gap bet ...
s that suffered
uncontained engine failure
A turbine engine failure occurs when a turbine engine unexpectedly stops producing power due to a malfunction other than fuel exhaustion. It often applies for aircraft, but other turbine engines can fail, like ground-based turbines used in power ...
s.
*
Tibet Airlines Flight 9833
Notes
References
External links
;
Cockpit Voice Recorder transcript and accident summaryNTSB investigation docket
{{NTSB
Aviation accidents and incidents in 2015
Aviation accidents and incidents in Nevada
2015 in Nevada
Harry Reid International Airport
Accidents and incidents involving the Boeing 777
2276
September 2015 events in the United States
Airliner accidents and incidents involving uncontained engine failure