United Airbus Suffers Engine Failure on Newark-Bound Flight

(Bloomberg) -- A New Jersey-bound United Airlines flight made an emergency landing shortly after takeoff Wednesday in Fort Myers, Florida, due to a problem with one of the engines.

One passenger who posted about the incident on Twitter described the incident as an “engine explosion.”

Key Insights

• The Airbus A320 with 79 passengers and five crew members returned to Southwest Florida International Airport at 12:58 p.m. ET, 46 minutes after departure for Newark, New Jersey, according to tracking service FlightAware.
• The United A320 has two IAE V2500 turbofan engines, not the Pratt & Whitney geared turbofans that have caused operational problems on some Airbus A320neo aircraft for other airlines.
• The incident was a “mechanical issue with the engine” and maintenance crews are inspecting the Airbus, said Charles Hobart, a spokesman for United Continental Holdings Inc.
• It wasn’t immediately clear if the engine failed or if the pilots shut it off due to a mechanical problem, Hobart said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Justin Bachman in Dallas at jbachman2@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Brendan Case at bcase4@bloomberg.net, Susan Warren

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