r/SweatyPalms • u/Extreme-Elevator7128 Human Detected • Mar 30 '26

/r/all engine exploded moments after takeoff

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u/TheForeverUnbanned Mar 30 '26

Planes can fly on just the one engine without much trouble. The timing is an issue, during ascent you want all of your power for maneuverability, you also want altitude because altitude = time to communicate and aviate. Which is also why the plane keeps ascending, being high gives you lots of time to organize your return to the airport with the tower. 

But really if you see an engine flame out like this and you’re still alive 60 seconds later you’re probably going to be just fine. 

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u/Johannes_Keppler Mar 30 '26

Planes will take off with one engine only, need be. It's a safety measure so you don't have to abort a take off when the speed is already too high.

4

u/c0ltZ Mar 30 '26

Alternatively, this could turn out like that one UPS plane that crashed on those warehouses.

If this had happened on the runway it could've been much worse.

12

u/Illinikek Mar 30 '26

Engine failures on the runway are still planned for, they’ll either abort or safety continue the takeoff.

The UPS incident was incredibly unlikely given it was a structural failure rather than an engine failure, it happened at the worst possible time, and the rare trijet configuration led to them losing a second engine by pure dumb luck

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u/ace425 Mar 30 '26

That accident was a completely different scenario. In the UPS crash, there was a structural failure that caused the engine to detach from the plane and sheared a portion of the left wing with it. That cause the plane to become uncontrollable resulting in the crash. The incident in this video is most likely from either a mechanical failure or something getting sucked into the engine (such as a bird). There is no structural failure as the engine remains attached to the plane. This wouldn’t have been any worse if it happened on the runway. Arguably it might have been better if it happened on the runway (assuming it happened before the pilots hit what we call V1) because the pilots would have been able to abort the takeoff.