Cathay Pacific may be forced to ground some of its Airbus A350 aircraft for longer than anticipated due to a worldwide spare parts shortage of a fuel hose component that has been identified as needing to be replaced following emergency inspections.
The Hong Kong-based airline is one of the largest operators of the A350, with 48 of the long-haul widebodies currently in its fleet. Engineers identified 15 A350s needing a new fuel hose component, and nine still need to be fixed.
The inspections were prompted by the emergency diversion of a five-year-old Airbus A350-1000 shortly after takeoff from Hong Kong International Airport on Monday after the pilots were alerted to a fire warning in the right-hand Rolls-Royce Trent XWB engine.
Although there was no engine fire, an inspection revealed that the fuel hose component had failed, and that discovery led engineers to carry out inspections of all the other A350s in Cathay Pacific’s fleet.
Cathay Pacific was forced to immediately pull 15 active A350s from service leading to a slew of flight cancellations, although hopes of quickly returning all of these planes to service have now been scuppered by the spare parts shortage, according to sources quoted by Bloomberg.
Other airlines, including the likes of Singapore Airlines and Japan Airlines, have carried out precautionary inspections of their A350s, although no flights have been canceled.
Cathay Pacific is hoping that it can get its remaining nine grounded A350s back in the air by Saturday, although that will be dependent on whether the airline can source the required parts from Rolls-Royce or other airlines that might have the component in stock.
The Rolls-Royce Trent XWB is the only engine option for A350 aircraft and although the engine is incredibly fuel efficient compared to older models, not all airlines have been impressed with the reliability of the engine.
Last year, the president of Emirates, Sir Tim Clark, went as far as to describe the Trent XWB as defective because of reliability issues when it operates in hot, humid and desert-like conditions.
Concerns over the reliability of the Trent XWB were cited as one of the main reasons for Emirates snubbing Airbus for an order of the larger A350-1000 variant. The Dubai-based carrier does, however, have an order for 65 smaller A350-900s and the first of this order is expected to enter service very soon.
Rolls-Royce has rejected criticism of the Trent XWB, although the engine manufacturer admits that it faces challenges when it operates in sandy conditions.
