Shrapnel from the engine explosion on Qantas’s QF32 severed a fuel pipe and narrowly missed the wing’s fuel tank, according to official preliminary reports seen by The Age newspaper.
The confidential reports reveal the extent to which metal components tore through the wing structure, severing wiring looms, chopping a main fuel pipe, puncturing structural spars and ribs and punching through wing surface panels.
Quoted by the Age, Professor Adrian Mouritz, head of aerospace and aviation engineering at RMIT University, said Qantas was ”very, very lucky” that thousands of litres of highly flammable jet fuel carried in the wings did not ignite from the ruptured fuel pipe or from a spark leaping from severed wiring.
”If that fuel ignited, that aircraft would have exploded,” he said.
As investigations continue, as many as 40 Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines fitted to the world’s fleet of superjumbo Airbus A380s may have to be replaced worldwide, Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce said.
