Plane bound for Lisbon returns to São Tomé with ″ strange noise ″ in the engine
A plane that took off this Saturday morning from São Tomé to Lisbon was forced to land at the airport of origin, after “a strange noise in engine 2”, informed the National Civil Aviation Institute (INAC) of São Tomé and Príncipe.
A source from the São Tomé government told Lusa that the STP Airways flight, operated by the Portuguese company euroAtlantic, traveled from São Tomé to Lisbon with “230 passengers” on board.
In a clarification note channeled to the media, INAC indicated that after taking off from the Sao Tome international airport, the pilots identified “a strange noise in engine 2, which is why they took the route to the city of Libreville (Gabon), in order to make an assessment of the in-flight situation, which culminated in the decision to turn off the referred engine”.
“In evaluating what happened, as engine 2 was assembled and due to the difficult weather conditions in Libreville, the crew team decided to return and carry out the landing procedures in São Tomé in coordination with São Tomé and Libreville air control”, said the Institute of Civil Aviation of São Tomé and Príncipe.
Since the aircraft had just taken off, “the take-off weight exceeded the recommended landing weight”, the INAC Sao Tome said, explaining that a diversion aircraft would be placed “in conditions of recommended weight for safe landing”, so the process of burning fuel was triggered in order to reach the appropriate weight for the conditions in which the aircraft was found.
“The aircraft are designed to have a performance with only one engine, and the pilots are trained in this type of procedure. In commercial flights, for safety reasons, redundancy must be guaranteed, if this redundancy is lost, landing in one of the airports marked as alternate within the provided security area provided “, clarified the institute.
Asserting that “the information that there was a refusal by Libreville” for the plane to land is false, INAC stressed that “in aviation, the safety of passengers and crew always comes first”.
Lusa requested clarification from the Portuguese airline euroAtlantic Airways about the occurrence on this flight from São Tomé to Lisbon, but this has not been possible so far.