Qantas continues to test A380s

Qantas says tests are still being carried out on its A380 fleet in Sydney and Los
Angeles to determine what caused a mid-air engine explosion on its A380 flight over
Indonesia last week.
Qantas spokesman Simon Rushton, says the company is still unable to say when its
A380 fleet will be back in the air, following Thursday's mid-flight failure in the
number two engine of QF32, an Airbus A380 superjumbo, over Indonesia.
"We're doing tests on the A380s in Sydney and in Los Angeles concurrently. There is
one engineer working in Sydney and three in Los Angeles," he said.
Australian investigators are being sent to the United Kingdom to oversee the
examination of the part involved in the explosion that occurred on the A380 flying
from Singapore to Sydney with 433 passengers and 26 crew.
The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) has asked residents of Indonesia's
Batam Island to help them find a crucial piece of debris lost from the A380.
The island was showered with debris and the ATSB is hoping that islanders can help
locate a particular geared disk.
On Sunday the ATSB urged any Batam Island residents who might have found parts of
the plane to hand them in to local police and have issued a photograph of a disk
similar to the one it is seeking.
"The recovery of that disk could be crucial to a full understanding of the nature of
the engine failure, and may have implications for the prevention of future similar
occurrences," an ATSB statement said.
The Indonesian Transportation Safety Committee has assisted the ATSB with the
recovery of a number of items of debris from the A380.
The items arrived in Singapore on Saturday, and a portion of a recovered engine
component will be sent to the UK to be examined by the manufacturer and other
experts.
Meanwhile, most of the passengers from another Qantas flight which was forced to
turn back to Singapore following a contained engine failure on Friday are expected
to arrive in Sydney Airport on Sunday night.
The Boeing 747, carrying 459 passengers and crew, experienced problems just six
minutes after the flight left Changi Airport in Singapore on its way to Sydney.
QF6 was forced to turn back and passengers were accommodated in Singapore. The first
50 passengers from this flight arrived in Sydney on Saturday night.
Meanwhile, Qantas' 90th anniversary celebrations continue in Brisbane where Qantas
ambassador, John Travolta, flew in to meet with 4,000 employees of the company and
their families and friends.