From: Randy Ryan [iflyff@flash.net]

Sent: Wednesday, December 27, 2000 8:24 AM

87 FIS; 57-0235 Trim Pad Fire Scare

Working a weekend standby we had only one aircraft to work and that was 57-235. Jets had put a new engine in it and we had only to trim it and put it to bed and we could go home. I rode the throttle that day and all through the process I kept telling the Jet tech that the EGT was on the high side. It frequently touched 630C and 635C was the limit. We progressed through the process and had a lot of trouble getting a good spool up to speed on throttle advance. It too, however, just made it under the limit. It spooled up slow and got hot doing it.

Well, we finally got to the point that the lead Jet troop said we were finished and could take the airplane home, remove all the direct reading instrumentation and make a quick run to leak check the caps and plugs. A quick tow back from the trim pad and the Jet troops got their act together while I got ready to do the run. When they were ready I climbed in and my group helped signal to start. I pushed the throttle outboard and advanced it to idle, got a light and then was terrified to see the EGT spinning far past the 635C limit, while the engine RPM remained under 20%, 30% being idle. All that nighttime rehearsal of emergency procedure then paid off as I shut it down by the book and shut off the fuel switches. The EGT however continued to climb and as I prepared to motor it to try to blow it out I was shocked to discover that my ground help had disconnected the Hi-pack and I had no air. I screamed at him to hook it back up and of course he just stood there. Finally he got the message and hooked it up while I advised Ops and Maintenance Control I was on fire.

We finally got the air moving and I managed to blow the tailpipe out and the fire went out. FD went home and I went to the truck to do the forms. As I sat there and placed the red X in the box I began to shake, and quickly it was uncontrollable. After I got composed I finished and went to debrief with the Chief of Maintenance (he'd come in when he overheard the radio traffic, very unhappy).

He made me go through every scenario you could in the simulator and decided that I was OK. It took a few days to get the verdict on the engine; #3 carbon seal had been broken on assembly, we never had a chance.

There is poetic justice though, a couple weeks later the COM Over temped one of our T-33's. My flight chief was thrilled and I was out of the shadow.