A Southwest Airlines Boeing 737-700 made an emergency landing at Philadelphia International Airport on April 17 after an apparent engine failure that caused one fatality.
Southwest flight 1380 was en route from New York La Guardia Airport to Dallas Love Field when passengers heard an explosion involving the left engine, which blew out a window and caused the cabin to depressurize, according to media reports. The flight crew diverted the aircraft to Philadelphia.
Powered by twin CFM56-7B turbofans, the aircraft had reached an altitude of 32,500 feet before descending; it landed at 11:23 a.m., according to tracking company FlightAware. The 737, registered as N772SW, was carrying 143 passengers and five crew, Southwest said.
Following the landing, FAA imposed a ground stop for aircraft at other airports waiting to depart for Philadelphia. At 1:45 p.m., the Philadelphia airport reported the ground stop had been lifted.
The passenger fatality was the first on a US airline since 2009 and Southwest's first onboard fatality. In December 2005, a Southwest plane slid off the runway at Chicago Midway International Airport, through a fence and crashed into a car, killing a child in the car.
“We are deeply saddened to confirm that there is one fatality resulting from this accident,” Southwest said in a late afternoon statement. “The entire Southwest Airlines family is devastated and extends its deepest, heartfelt sympathy to the customers, employees, family members and loved ones affected by this tragic event. We have activated our emergency response team and are deploying every resource to support those affected by this tragedy.”
The NTSB dispatched a go-team to investigate the scene. Briefly addressing reporters at Reagan Washington National Airport prior to departing for Philadelphia, chairman Robert Sumwalt described the incident as “an apparent in-flight engine failure,” but declined to use the term uncontained engine failure.
“I don’t want to sound bureaucratic, but ‘uncontained engine failure’ connotates a very specific thing,” Sumwalt said. “The engine is designed not to have an uncontained engine failure. There are protection rings around the engine to keep shrapnel from coming out. Even though we believe that there were parts coming out of this engine, it may not have been in that section of the engine that technically would qualify this as an uncontained engine failure.”
Manufactured by CFM International, the joint venture of GE Aviation and France’s Safran Aircraft Engines, the CFM56 engine type entered service in 1997 and has accumulated more than 350 million flight hours.
“The NTSB confirmed that there was one fatality. The CFM team worldwide expresses its deepest condolences to the family of that victim,” CFM spokesperson Jamie Jewell said. “We have sent a team of technical representatives to the site to support the NTSB and the investigation, along with supporting Southwest.”
In August 2016, a Southwest 737 en route from New Orleans to Orlando experienced an uncontained engine failure of the left CFM56 engine after climbing to 31,000 feet. The flight crew landed the aircraft safely at Pensacola International Airport.