July 22, 2003	Tuesday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 21, 1424

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RAWALPINDI, July 21: The engines of PIA’s B-747 Combi that aborted take-off Sunday morning has had a series of dramatic failures in the past few weeks, all coincidentally on international flights, claimed sources in the airline.

Sources said the Sunday incident was one of three such aborts suffered by the same plane with same engines in as many weeks. One of these aborts had occurred on a London-bound flight from Karachi.

The engineering branch, they said, had not been able to fix the problem and had made only minor repairs, adding that the engines were not replaced.

However, the claim was denied by the PIA administration.

The national flag carrier’s General Manager Imran Gardezi said there had been no such incidents in the past few weeks, describing all such stories as being fabricated in a bid to cover up the actual fault.

Without specifying “the actual fault,” he said that investigations were underway and it was premature to say anything.

The plane was fitted with General Electric’s GE CF6 engines.

Mr Gardezi defended the CF6 engines saying they were quite reliable.

Interviews with senior officials of the PIA pointed towards an ongoing struggle between different sections of the airline to lay the blame on each other’s doorsteps.

A new theory is making rounds in the PIA circles, which holds the pilot responsible for the “whole mess”.

A senior official said the pilot should have taken off in any case at the speed of 140 knots and could have again safely landed at Islamabad airport instead of applying emergency brakes and aborting the flight, which caused flights disruption.

Meanwhile, officials speaking about the on-going investigations into the incident said the black box is being deciphered.

It was also learnt that the aircraft’s engines had not yet been checked.

The flight record has been taken into custody by investigators, who had arrived from Karachi earlier.

The pilot in his statement recorded before the investigating team has been quoted as having told them that two of the engines did not give enough thrust for the take off, therefore, he had no other option, but to abort.

The pilot’s last message to the control tower was that the plane had developed fault and he is aborting the take-off for which he needs emergency assistance.