Qantas Airbus A380 flies Sydney to Dallas with mechanic’s work light left inside wing for two days
Hundreds of passengers flew between Sydney and Dallas before a startling maintenance mistake hidden inside the Qantas jet was discovered.
A Qantas passenger jet carrying hundreds of travellers flew between Australia and the United States with a mechanic’s work light accidentally left inside its wing, investigators have revealed.
The Airbus A380 had undergone air-conditioning maintenance in Sydney on January 7 before departing for Dallas Fort Worth International Airport.
But the 33cm-tall battery-powered light was not discovered until the aircraft returned to Sydney two days later, according to findings released by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau.
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“In addition, while returning the tools, the maintainer did not identify that the work light had not been returned and the unreturned tool check at the end of the shift also did not identify the unreturned light.”
Investigators found a maintenance engineer had checked out the light and other equipment before work began by scanning their barcodes, Australian investigators reported.
Two workers later used the light while replacing an air-conditioning sensor, placing it inside the aircraft’s wing to illuminate the area. The light was eventually switched off, but the workers failed to remove it once the job was finished.
Another engineer subsequently inspected the completed maintenance and conducted a search for foreign objects, but the forgotten light was not spotted.
The A380 was then cleared to fly from Sydney to Dallas before making the journey back to Australia, with the light remaining inside the wing throughout both flights.
It was only after the aircraft returned to Sydney that an employee reviewing an outstanding equipment report realised something was missing.
“They identified that two days earlier, a work light had been signed out against (the plane) and had not been returned,” the report said.
The maintenance engineer who had originally checked out the equipment “could not confirm if the work light had been returned and raised the possibility that it remained in the aircraft wing.”
The light was subsequently found, with Qantas saying it had not affected the operation of the aircraft during either flight.
“Qantas reported this event to the ATSB and, since the event, have strengthened our tool control procedures, including introducing a mandatory pre-clearance check to confirm all tooling is accounted for following maintenance,” an airline spokesperson said in a statement.
The incident follows another tool-control mishap involving a Qantas A380 in December 2023, when maintenance workers accidentally left a tool inside one of the aircraft’s engines following three days of work at Los Angeles International Airport.
That aircraft went on to complete 34 flights over almost a month before the forgotten tool was eventually discovered.
Previous incidents have demonstrated the potentially serious consequences of equipment being left behind during aircraft maintenance. In 2020, a removable screwdriver tip measuring just one inch caused substantial damage to the engine of a Jetstar Airbus A320 during take-off after remaining undetected for more than 100 flights.
No passengers were injured in that incident.
