The provisional report on the collapse of the landing gear of a Lufthansa Boeing 787 Dreamliner concludes that the mandatory locking pin was not in place at the time of the accident recorded in early June at Frankfurt airport.
As the document details, the landing gear retracted just after technicians in the cockpit moved a control lever to the "up" position during a maintenance test carried out on June 4, according to information published by "Bloomberg" this Thursday.
The report specifies that one of the required safety pins had not been previously inserted into the landing gear, which caused the nose of the aircraft to impact the runway.
As a consequence of the collapse, the casings of both Rolls-Royce Holdings Trent 1000 engines also hit the concrete, and various sections of the fuselage, the landing gear itself, and the cargo door were seriously damaged.
Lufthansa indicated this Thursday that it is cooperating with the authorities responsible for the investigation and will not comment on the details of the case. For its part, the German Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation (BFU) has stated that there is still no estimated date for the publication of the final report.
At the time of the incident, there were no passengers on board, although the aircraft, which was scheduled for a flight to Los Angeles (United States), carried 28 people. Two of them suffered serious injuries and another 20, minor injuries. In addition, one person operating equipment outside the aircraft also suffered minor injuries.
Following the incident, the airline had to pump out 60,000 kilograms of fuel and used inflatable mats to lift the front of the aircraft and separate it from the ground. Subsequently, the aircraft was towed to a hangar for a more thorough inspection, although it has not yet been specified how long it will remain out of service.
The Lufthansa Group continues with its fleet renewal program to replace older models, reflected in an order for 10 Airbus A350-900s and another 10 Boeing 787-9s, valued at list price at 7.7 billion dollars (6.54 billion euros), with deliveries scheduled between 2032 and 2034.
With this operation, the group now has a total of 232 next-generation aircraft on order, of which 107 are long-range aircraft.