Australian investigators have revealed that a Qantas Airbus A380 , registered as VH-OQI, flew for more than 290 hours with a tool inside one of the engines before it was found again during regular maintenance. Borescope inspection In a report the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) published on November 14, the investigators detailed an event when maintenance engineers left a tool inside the outboard left engine on a Qantas A380. According to the report, the aircraft involved in the foreign object debris (FOD), an A380, registered as VH-OQI, underwent line maintenance procedures at the Australian carrier’s facilities at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) on December 6, 2023.
The three-day maintenance visit included a borescope inspection of the left outboard engine’s intermediate-pressure compressor. “The borescope inspection was to be conducted on day one and was estimated to take approximately 6 hours.” The ATSB highlighted that initially, a licensed aircraft maintenance engineer (LAME 1) assigned two AMEs, AME 1 and AME 2, as well as a support engineer, to conduct the borescope inspection.
The two AMEs collected the required managed – meaning administratively allocated – tooling for the task, including a nylon rod, also known as a turning tool. “The support engineer entered the engine inlet via the access stand and rotated the engine’s intermediate-pressure compressor, as required, using the turning tool.” However, AME 1, who signed out the too.
