Aviation News

Boeing, General Electric and US officials are investigating a malfunction that spewed metal debris from a GE engine on a 787 Dreamliner and caused an airport grass fire in South Carolina.

Material was ejected from the back of the engine during preflight testing, Rick Kennedy, a GE spokesman, said yesterday. Julie O’Donnell, a Boeing spokeswoman, declined to comment, citing the inquiry into the July 28 mishap at the Charleston, South Carolina, airport.

The incident was the second in less than 10 days involving engines from GE and Rolls-Royce on Dreamliners. Japan’s All Nippon Airways pulled five 787s with Rolls-Royce engines from service on July 21 after the manufacturer found that some components had a shorter-than-expected service life.

Boeing is “unaware of any operational issue that would present concerns about the continued safe operation of in- service 787s powered by GE engines,” according to a statement from the Chicago-based planemaker.

The jet involved in the episode is due to go to Air India and is the first “significant issue” with GE’s new GEnx engine, Kennedy said. About 100 of the units are in service and are performing well, he said.

The National Transportation Safety Board and GE are working with Boeing to learn what went wrong. The fire occurred when debris from the plane fell onto the runway and into grass at the Charleston airport, said Becky Beaman, a spokeswoman for the facility. No one was hurt, she said.

Composite materials

Two arriving flights were diverted and a departing Southwest Airlines plane was delayed at the Charleston airport. The facility is served by five airlines, including United Continental, Delta Air Lines and American Airlines.

Boeing’s North Charleston factory is one of two assembly sites for the twin-engine 787, along with the company’s wide- body plant in Everett, Washington.

The Dreamliner is the world’s first jetliner with a fuselage and wings built chiefly from composite materials. All Nippon and Japan Airlines are the only airlines flying the plane, which entered commercial service in late 2011 after more than three years of delays.

Boeing designed the plane to fly long-haul routes while cutting fuel consumption. The 787 has become Boeing’s fastest- selling new model ever, with 859 orders through June, according to the planemaker’s website.

All Nippon was the first carrier to fly the Dreamliner in commercial service. In September, United Continental expects to start receiving 787s, which will make it the first US airline to operate the jet.

• security

Pronunciation: EH

Directions: Practice by saying the word pairs and example sentences, then speak the words from this reading.

Word PairsPet-pat, wet-wait, tell-tail, test-taste, pepper-paper

Example sentence:You better let the wet letter dry.

Examples from this reading:Interrogated - S - Envisioning -

Reading

Directions: Read the following passage carefully.

As the beloved children's author Roald Dahl once wrote, "Never do anything by halves if you want to get away with it. Be outrageous. Go the whole hog. Make sure everything you do is so completely crazy it's unbelievable."

Liam Corcoran appears to have taken that to heart. In a world of Olympic dreams, the 11-year-old British boy has achieved his own: running away from home, and making it past hyped-up airline security and 1,000 miles to Rome — without a passport, a ticket or a boarding pass.

It's every kid's greatest fantasy. And every airline official's worst nightmare: a humiliating security breach, just days before the start of the Olympic games.

Liam's Big Adventure began on Tuesday, at a shopping mall near the airport in Manchester. That's where he gave his tiresome mother the slip. Not long after, he found himself at the airport, searching for a bathroom. He ducked into a gaggle of children as they passed with their parents through exactly five security controls.

First, the passport and boarding pass check in the departure area. Then, the individual screening of all passengers and their hand luggage. Followed by another passport and boarding pass check at the gate; a boarding pass check at the entrance to the plane; and once aboard, a head count by cabin crew.

Liam finally found his loo on the plane. But shortly after takeoff, he looked a bit sad. Fellow passengers asked why he was all alone, and he admitted he was running away from home. Once discovered, he was interrogated, probably by some huffy grownups, and put right on a return flight home.

But Liam didn't let that ruin his spirits. No, this was his first trip abroad, and as he later told reporters, "Getting onto the plane was easier than doing my homework."

It was his moment of brilliance and glory. He'd pulled off the modern version of "From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler," in which an 11-year-old runs away from home to hide out in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The girl eludes security by blending in with school groups, bathes in the fountain and sleeps in an antique bed.

Back when that novel was written, in the 1960s, it was probably more of a coup to sneak into a museum than onto an airplane. When flying, you basically walked up to the counter, bought your ticket without showing any identification, and made your way unsupervised onto the tarmac and up the steps to the plane.

Nowadays, airplanes have become like Mount Everest for stowaways. Adults will look at this security breach in fear and outrage, envisioning all the horrific possibilities. But it's nice to know that for kids, at least, there's still a small taste of delight.

Question 1: Identify a quote from the text that you think is very important and explain why.

Question 2: If you were asked to edit this text down to half its length, what details would you remove?

Question 3: What is the main idea of this text? What details from the text support the main idea?

Question 4: Write 3-5 sentences summarizing the text.

Question 5: What is the purpose of this text?

Focus on Grammar

Adjectives tell us about people, "Maria is a smart", places "Paris is beautiful",or things "The food is good"
What are the adjectives in the sentence(s) below?

   Directions: Identify how the adjectivesis used in the sentence(s) below

1. But shortly after takeoff, he looked a bit sad.
2. That's where he gave his tiresome mother the slip.
3. He'd pulled off the modern version of From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs.
4. Then, the individual screening of all passengers and their hand luggage.

Word Roots & Stems

Rule: The suffix ychanges a noun into an adjective, like dirty.

Directions: Identify the word that ends with -y in each sentence and write it on the line.

1. Make sure everything you do is so completely crazy it is unbelievable.

1. Once discovered, he was interrogated, probably by some huffy grownups, and put right on a return flight home.

Directions: Fill in the blanks below, just as in the models.

Vocabulary Practice

FILL IN THE BLANK

Directions: Use the word bank to identify the word that best completes the sentence.

1. The boy _______________ he broke the window.
2. She _______________ everything she set out to do.
3. The _______________ concert was full of naked people and bad language.
4. After 3 hours, he _______________ finished the test
5. Columbus _______________ America
6. Water pollution is a growing problem in the _______________ world.
7. I am _______________ out of money.
8. Watching TV can be _______________, it's better to go outside and play.
9. An army _______________ ended the democratic government.
10. The original _______________ of the song was better than the one in the movie.
11. I lost my keys but Joe _______________ them.
12. The police _______________ him for three hours before they decided he was innocent.

Vocabulary Practice

MATCHING

Directions: Write the letter of word that matches the definition on the line. If it helps, feel free to also draw a line between the definition and the matching word.

1. hyped-up
2. finally
3. outrageous
4. tiresome
5. version
6. interrogated
7. achieved
8. admitted
9. found
10. discovered
11. coup
12. s
13. completely
14. Big
15. modern

• 
  _______ Have an excess of energy, be excited.
• 
  _______ Confess; say that one is responsible for something.
• 
  _______ Large.
• 
  _______ Succeed in reaching a goal.
• 
  _______ Shockingly bad
• 
  _______
• 
  _______ At last.
• 
  _______ To be the first to see or learn about and report on something.
• 
  _______ Related to the present time or the recent past
• 
  _______ Totally
• 
  _______ Boring and dull.
• 
  _______ A quick and successful action. Often used for taking over a government.
• 
  _______ A specific form or variation of something.
• 
  _______ To locate something.
• 
  _______ To examine formally by questioning.

The idea is that airline staff will make a departure gate announcement warning passengers to “go” in the terminal. There will also be an apology for any “inconvenience” caused.

The move comes after Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary’s plan for coin-operated toilets on his fleet of 737s were shelved following a public outcry last year.

The leaked memo reveals: “In the rare event there is a technical problem with all toilets on board, permission may be granted for the flight to depart with no serviceable toilets. Any passenger not wishing to travel can apply for a refund.”

Ryanair’s longest UK route is from Stansted to the Greek island of Rhodes, meaning four hours of potential discomfort. Typically there are around 180 passengers aboard, many of whom need to use a toilet during the flight. Last year, Ryanair revealed plans to remove two of the three on-board loos to make room for extra passengers. The proposal is still being discussed.

The Association of British Travel Agents told the Daily Record: “There is no legal requirement for planes to have functioning toilets. But not having even one working could be an unpleasant experience and might be a step too far in the ‘no frills’ concept.”

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An unruly, 81-year-old blind passenger aboard a Spirit Airlines red-eye flight from Los Angeles to Florida forced the pilot to make an emergency landing in Texas for a 14-hour layover with about 100 on board.

Spirit Airlines Airbus A319 from Los Angeles departed on time at 9:58 p.m. PT Saturday, with a scheduled landing at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport at 6 a.m. Sunday. Midway through the flight, however, the disruptive passenger forced the pilot to make an emergency landing at Houston’s Bush Intercontinental Airport, where the roughly 100 passengers remained for most of the next day, KTRK-TV reported.

The elderly blind man was kicking and screaming, passengers told ABC News Ft. Lauderdale affiliate Local 10 News.

“This man was like touching everybody,” said one woman who was on the flight. “He was going to the bathroom, not letting anybody go to the bathroom, come out of their seats, you know, kicking the walls.”

Passengers were reportedly kept in the plane on the tarmac for two hours, without air conditioning, before being allowed into the terminal. The airline then told the waylaid passengers that they would be shuttled by bus five hours north to Dallas, because Spirit does not operate a flight between Houston and Ft. Lauderdale, and did not have a fresh crew to take over the controls.

Passengers became irate, yelling and screaming at airline staff.

“We went ‘No! No Way!’” passenger Theresa Shaviano told Local 10. “And it took them 25 minutes afterwards to come back and tell us that they were going to have a plane for us.”

“It was terrible. It was unreal. It was painful,” she said of the delay.

In a statement released today, Spirit Airlines said the disruptive passenger was turned over to the Houston Police Department.

Spirit Airlines eventually decided to fly the passengers in a different plane, and the flight arrived in South Florida about 8 p.m. Sunday, 14 full hours after the scheduled arrival time.

“We understand that this has been an inconvenience for our customers, but the safety of our customers is always the top priority,” the airline said in a statement. “All customers are being given full refunds for this inconvenience.”

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