Overview
- The A350-900 departed Adelaide about 10:35pm on Monday and turned back roughly two hours later after crew detected a technical problem and shut down the left engine as a precaution.
- The aircraft landed safely in the early hours of Tuesday with airport fire crews on standby and all passengers and crew disembarked without injury.
- Several passengers reported seeing sparks from the engine during the return but those eyewitness accounts have not been independently verified by investigators.
- Emirates says affected travellers were offered hotels or sent home and will be rebooked on a later service while engineers examine the aircraft and the Australian Transport Safety Bureau carries out its inquiry.
- The A350-900 is a twin-engine long-haul jet and pilots use precautionary engine shutdowns as an established safety procedure, so investigators will focus on technical causes and any wider operational impacts to schedules.