Singapore Air grounded A380s

[Sam Chui]

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http://www.smh.com.au/travel/travel-...110-17mwq.html

The fallout from Qantas's A380 mid-air emergency has escalated after Singapore Airlines today took three of its superjumbos out of service to replace their Rolls Royce engines.

Singapore Airlines grounded the aircraft for "precautionary engine changes" over concerns raised during inspections, an airline spokeswoman said today.

One aircraft in Melbourne, one in Sydney and another in London have been forbidden to fly until the engines are replaced.

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A Singapore Airlines Airbus A380 at Changi Airport. Photo: Reuters

Passengers on the Australian flights are being shunted to other services while the work is done.

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"Based on further analysis of inspection findings as the investigation into last week's [Qantas] incident progresses, we are going to be carrying out precautionary engine changes on three of our A380s," the spokeswoman said.

"That explains the aircraft change out of Melbourne this morning, and that's also going to impact our A380 fight out of Sydney at 4.30pm. We apologise for any disruption this causes."

The spokeswoman said the delay to Melbourne passengers would be "about two hours" and travellers would be put on the airline's later services.

The airline said that Rolls-Royce had recommended further detailed inspections of three engines – one on each aircraft – as a "result of oil staining".

"This is to ensure that the cause of the oil staining can be determined," a spokesman said.

Qantas has grounded its fleet of six Airbus A380 aircraft until at least late tomorrow, after the investigation into last Thursday's near-disaster was narrowed to oil leaks in the turbines.

Just two days ago, Singapore Airlines had said that it had carried out checks on all of the engines used on its A380s late last week and had "absolutely no findings of concern".

Singapore Airlines and Lufthansa had been operating their A380s, which use the same Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines as Qantas, after the incident involving QF32 last Thursday.

Qantas has said that engines on its A380s operated on a "slightly higher" power rating than the other two airlines' Trent 900s, and whether this was relevant to last week's incident was being investigated.