Professor Doug Drury, an Australian aviation expert with 40 years of experience told CNN whether a single-engine aircraft could fly.
“Such cases, unfortunately, sometimes happen in aviation: I had an engine failure during a flight, but the good news is that this is an extremely rare occurrence. This makes aviation the safest mode of transport in the world,” the expert notes. Pilots spend a lot of time on full-motion simulators, working out just such situations.”
“When the engine has failed and there is a lot of water under you, there are instructions that you have to follow. It becomes habitual: you don’t panic, don’t derail, remember your training, and that’s what happened in this case,” he adds.
Can planes fly with only one engine?
“Absolutely. That’s what they’re designed for. By law, planes must be able to fly from point A to point B, over water with only one engine. According to the guidelines developed by safety regulators in Australia, any plane that takes off to reach a certain point destination should be able to get there on one engine based on the load determined before takeoff,” the aviation expert said.
The rule ensures that even if one engine fails, the plane can still reach its destination safely, he said. It can fly until it runs out of fuel. These planes are designed to fly just as well on one engine as they do on two.
“If only one engine is running, then you will not have maximum thrust for takeoff, but you will be able to take off and land. But although the plane can fly on one engine, it very rarely happens that the engine fails in the middle of the flight,” emphasizes the former pilot.
Airline maintenance procedures are well established and technicians are licensed to the same level and quality as pilots. Typically, someone does maintenance on the aircraft on the ground, but someone comes along to inspect it and test it to make sure it’s 100 percent working.
There are ground tests, flight tests, and certification processes that must be completed before an aircraft can take passengers. That is why these events are so rare.
A similar incident occurred in mid-January 2023. A Qantas flight from Auckland landed safely in Sydney after a mid-flight distress call was heard due to a “sporadic” engine failure that forced the pilot to land on one engine.