Engine inspections force flight cancellations at Phoenix airport

PHOENIX — Southwest Airlines cancelled 29 of its flights to and from Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport on Monday.

This came after the airline canceled 40 of its flights for engine blade inspections on Sunday. However, the number of Monday’s cancellations that were due to engine inspections remained unclear.

The airline canceled a total of 129 flights on Monday, according to Flight Aware. 

The news came after a Southwest flight had to make an emergency landing last week when the airline’s Boeing 737 experienced engine and window damage.

The National Transportation Safety Board believed that one of the engine blades snapped on the jet and debris was hurled at the window.

The incident resulted in the death of one passenger after she was sucked partway through the broken window.

Following the emergency landing, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered hundreds of inspections on jet engines and Southwest was performing it’s own engine checks on a number of the airline’s planes.

The airline mentioned in a news release that the engine checks were not a part of the FAA’s directive but rather voluntary checks.

Southwest also said that when available, the airline was performing inspections overnight and was utilizing spare aircraft in an effort to avoid cancellations.