MONTREAL – An Air Canada Boeing 737-8 MAX flying from Arizona to here with three crew members on board experienced an engine problem that forced it to land in Tucson, said the carrier yesterday.
Shortly after taking off on December 22, the pilots “received an engine notification, and according to the standard operating procedure for such a situation, they decided to shut down an engine”, said Air Canada in a statement in French.
“The aircraft was rerouted to Tucson, where it landed normally and remains,” it said, without specifying the nature of the malfunction, which occurred during a non-commercial “positioning flight”.
According to Belgian specialist site Aviation24.be, which first reported the emergency landing, the malfunction was due to a drop in hydraulic pressure in the left engine.
The Canadian government announced in mid-December that it has approved the design changes Boeing made to its 737 MAX planes after two crashes that killed 346 people led to the model being grounded.
But the aircraft, purchased by Canadian airlines Air Canada, Westjet and Sunwing, has not yet been authorised to make commercial flights in Canadian airspace.
The US last month authorised the MAX to fly again, but several modifications will have to be made to the plane before it can be returned to service, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.
Two weeks ago, Brazilian airline Gol became the first in the world to put the MAX back into service. – AFP, December 26, 2020
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