Originally Posted by
FLYDCA
It would not surprise me at all if this was deferred maintenance. With billions of dollars in cuts occurring some concerning choices may be coming to light.
UAL may be skimping on
everything related to the passenger experience, but I have seen absolutely no indication that the maintenance budget is being unnecessarily curtailed. To the contrary, there has been substantial investment in fleet maintenance since the merger.
Sometimes things happen to airplanes that cause them to be taken out of service, and sometimes, the extent of damage or otherwise is not known until the aircraft is safely on the ground. I can assure you that no pilot worth his salt would ever embark on a long ETOPS haul with the knowledge that there was some irregularity with an engine at such an early phase of flight. The engines are probably the most sacrosanct aircraft system in ETOPS flying. Pilots will not take chances with that.