Qantas has another engine scare

This time it was a 747 carrying 344 passengers that had been preparing to take off for a Sydney-to-L.A. run. The airline reports a "contained turbine blade failure" on one of the engines. Passengers say they heard ''a loud bang'' and watched black smoke pour out of the engine. They were put on a second plane that left a few hours later. It happened on the same weekend that the Australian carrier resumed its Airbus A380 service to L.A. following a mid-air engine explosion over Indonesia's Batam Island on Nov. 4. (Sydney Morning Herald) From Bloomberg:

The grounding of Qantas's A380s cost the airline as much as A$207 million ($204 million), according to Bank of America Corp.'s Merrill Lynch. The carrier typically fills 3 percentage points more seats and gets 3 percent more revenue per passenger on A380s than on other planes such as Boeing Co. 747s, Harbison said. Qantas resumed A380 flights to Europe via Singapore on Nov. 27. It has been serving L.A. with different planes, such as 747s.