Pratt & Whitney ordered to inspect some engines over failure concerns

Pratt & Whitney is being required by the Federal Aviation Administration to inspect and repair some of its Airbus passenger jet engines because of a potential risk that some parts could fail and damage the planes while in flight.

Officials at P&W’s corporate parent — RTX Corp., the former Raytheon Technologies — first announced the need for inspection and repair work on the engine late last month during a conference call with financial analysts late last month. But FAA officials reiterated the urgency of their required inspections in an announcement made Friday.

Pratt & Whitney has its headquarters in East Hartford and a major plant in Middletown, while RTX is based in Waltham, Mass.

The latest announcement from the FAA comes nine months after an engine shutdown last December that required pilots of an Airbus A320neo to abort a takeoff. FAA officials said they will require ultrasonic inspections of the engine parts, which impacts PW1100G-JM geared turbofan engines Airbus uses for its A320neo passenger jet, within 30 days.

The rule replaces an agency directive from October, which told aircraft operators to have the engines checked at their next shop visit. The new order will require airlines to remove 1,200 engines from Airbus jets and potentially replace parts that were made with powder metal that became contaminated in the manufacturing process.

Pratt officials were not immediately available for comment on Friday regarding the FAA’s actions. RTX Chief Executive Officer Greg Hayes said during last month’s conference call with financial analysts that “it’s going to be expensive” to do the inspections and parts replacements required by the FAA’s order.

Pratt & Whitney plans to accelerate engine removals and inspections with the goal of completing 200 by September and as many as 1,000 more through next year, making an initial projection of a $500 million reduction in free cash flow. Hayes said “the big question is what are we going to have to do in terms of compensation to the airlines.”

“We’ve got two years to work through that, and we will figure that out,” he said.

Michael Boyd, president of a Colorado-based aviation consulting firm, the scope of the impact as well as the financial hit P&W and RTX take is still being determined.

“Different airlines have different numbers of A320neo passenger jets in their fleets,” Boyd said. “Pratt knows what it’s doing, but it really depends what they find when they get inside the engines.”

Airlines that make a broader used of Airbus’ A320neo jets will have to take those planes out of service, which may mean fewer flights to certain destinations, he said. That will be a part of the how much each airline is compensated, according to Boyd.

The company traced the issue to its HMI Metal Powders facility outside Utica, N.Y., which produces powdered coatings for disks manufactured at a plant in Columbus, Ga. The powder contaminants affect turbine disks in the passenger jet engines.