Jet Engine Explosion On UK Runway [Video]

A jet engine explosion on a Thomas Cook Airbus 330 was captured for YouTube viral video glory by planespotter Simon Lowe. He uploaded the footage on Monday and has already attracted over 600,000 views.

The fiery explosion occurred on Monday, June 24 on the aircraft which was headed for the Dominican Republic with a load of 325 passengers. As you can see for yourself, the pilot kept his cool despite the untimely engine problem.

A Yahoo! report said that the passengers and crew were never in danger. However, as you’ve probably already guessed, they were deplaned and boarded on an alternate aircraft to take them to their destination.

Of course there’s the inevitable debate on YouTube from those people who object to Lowe characterizing the uncontrolled blast as a jet engine explosion.

A sample comment is this one from O’Hare Aviation & Planespotting — Runway25Right:

“[Y]eah, it’s called a compressor stall. Not an engine explosion. The risk is mundane and minor. People who don’t know aviation well (Simon Lowe) think it’s an explosion though but an engine explosion according to people who know better is where the engine literally blows up completely.

“In the aviation community, this sort of video barely draws attention from anyone. At best, a captain might raise an eyebrow.”

Fair enough. However, it seems to me that we’ve had these debates before.

A contact in heavy industry has assured me that any time you have an uncontrolled release of energy, it can be honestly characterized as an explosion.

So let’s check out that video again. Hmm.

It goes boom, and it catches on fire. It might not make the airline industry happy to hear me say so, but I’m satisfied that this event does qualify as an uncontrolled release of energy.

So what do you think? Sure, we’re all glad to know that it’s mostly harmless.

But wouldn’t you still call this a jet engine explosion?

[Thomas Cook aircraft photo by Craig Sunter via Flickr and Creative Commons]