Dyr blemme i Kina - Curt Lewis

Fire foam sprayed on wrong aircraft at Chinese airport 'caused 120m yuan in damage to engines'

Twin engines of Fujian Airlines 737 will need to be replaced in costly operation that will take plane out of service for at least one week

Fire trucks at Fuzhou Changle International Airport mistakenly dowse a Fujian Airlines 737 in fire foam on Thursday. The apparently malfunctioning aircraft, which reported sparks coming from its engine, belonged to China Airlines. Photo: Thepaper.cn

Fuzhou Airlines confirmed on Saturday that foam mistakenly sprayed on one of its Boeing 737-800 passenger liners on Thursday damaged both its engines and would cost about 120 million yuan (HK$144 million) to replace them, The Paper.cn, a news portal based in Shanghai, reported.

The airlines said on Saturday on its Weibo account that the fire-retardant foam had entered crucial parts of the engine, requiring both engines to be replaced in an operation that would take a week or more to complete and return the aircraft to service.

Staff from the airline told mainland media that it had launched its claims procedures, but they did not disclose who claim was against and how much compensation would be sought.

On Thursday, eight fire trucks at Fuzhou Changle International Airport mistakenly sprayed the Fuzhou Airlines jet to "cool down" its before they discovered out that it was another plane operated by Air China that was reported to have sparks coming out of its engines.

The airport later explained that when the firemen arrived, the Air China aircraft had already shut down its engines, which led to the erroneous spraying of the Fuzhou Airlines plane.

The incident shut down the airport's runways for an hour and 40 minutes and delayed 24 outbound flights.