Description

On 2 January 2005, a Boeing 767-300 being operated by Air Canada on a scheduled passenger flight in day Visual Meteorological Conditions (VMC) from Toronto to Santiago, Chile was approximately 180 nm north of the intended destination and in the cruise at FL370 when it suffered a run down of the left engine which flight deck indications suggested was due to fuel starvation. A MAYDAY was declared to ATC and during the subsequent drift down descent, with the cross feed valve open, the failed engine was successfully restarted and the flight was completed with both engines operating without further incident.

Investigation

An Investigation was carried out by the Canadian Transportation Safety Board. It was established that the only prior warning which the flight crew had received of the imminent engine run down 45 seconds before it occurred was an Engine Indicating and Crew Alerting System (EICAS) warning of low fuel pressure output from both boost pumps in the left main fuel tank. Subsequently, the left engine had been successfully restarted passing approximately FL230, 18 minutes after the rundown, with both engines operating normally thereafter and the remainder of the flight completed without further incident