An engine fire indication on a Cathay Pacific Airbus A350 led to the grounding and inspection of multiple A350s, with interesting results.

This sequence of events started with an incident that took place on Monday, the 2nd of September this year, involving Cathay Pacific flight CX-383. The airline performs this flight four times per week, departing from Hong Kong International Airport (VHHH).

The flight’s destination is Zurich Airport (LSZH) in Switzerland and it usually takes around twelve-and-a-half hours. So far, neither Cathay Pacific nor the authorities have indicated how many passengers and crew were on board the A350 on the day of the incident.

The flight made a routine departure from runway 07R in Hong Kong, but the flight crew stopped their climb at 9,000 feet. The Cathay Pacific Airbus A350 reportedly gave the pilots a fire indication on its right-hand (No2) engine.

Before landing, the crew decided to dump fuel which they did at the same altitude (9,000 feet). The Cathay Pacific crew also went through their checklists, which led them to shut down the right engine of their A350. They also reportedly discharged a fire bottle into the engine.

After completing their fuel dump, the pilots landed safely back in Hong Kong using runway 07L. There are no reports of any injuries among the passengers and crew. In total, their aircraft had spent an hour and ten minutes in the air.

Cathay Pacific A350 Engine Inspections

The flight’s passengers then had an incident-free journey to Zurich on board a different A350. But in the meantime, the airline started investigating the cause of this apparent in-flight engine fire.

The incident aircraft is a five-and-a-half-year-old A350-1000, with registration B-LXI. Like all A350s, the aircraft has Rolls-Royce Trent XWB engines. The A350-900 has the XWB-84, while the bigger A350-1000 has the more powerful XWB-97. Cathay Pacific operates both A350 variants.

The airline briefly grounded all of its A350s for inspections. Cathay has a total of 48 A350s, three of which are in storage or undergoing maintenance. The grounding caused a substantial drop in Rolls-Royce’s share price.

Fortunately, the checks that Cathay Pacific had to do on its A350 engines were quick, not requiring engine removal. According to Reuters, the problem involved “a fuel nozzle”. Other sources (Aviation Herald) report an issue with a flexible fuel line.

Cathay Pacific stated that it has identified 15 aircraft in its A350 fleet that require engine component replacements. As of this writing, the airline has performed this work on three planes. It is not clear if all of these jets are A350-1000s or a mix of -900s and -1000s.

Rolls-Royce’s share price started recovering as soon as Cathay announced that three inspected aircraft were already repaired. However, the airline won’t return its A350 fleet to service until Saturday. The engine manufacturer still hasn’t issued a directive to inspect these engines. Other operators of A350s continue to fly them normally.