A privately owned Pakistani airline Serene Air Airbus A330 suffered an in-flight engine shut down while en route from Karachi to Islamabad, Pakistan.
The incident occurred on April 5, 2021, when the Airbus A330-200 aircraft, registered as AP-BNE, took off at 12.51 p.m. (UTC) from Jinnah International Airport (KHI) and was performing domestic flight ER-502 to Islamabad International Airport (ISB). The jet carrying 120 passengers on board had already reached FL370 and was flying over Northeast Karachi when the flight crew noticed an engine stall indication. The pilots shut the aircraft engine down and went down to FL220.
Then the flight crew decided to turn around and return to the airport of departure. About 40 minutes later, at around 3 p.m., the jet safely landed at KHI airport on runway 25L with no further incidents or injuries reported.
It was the first incident for Serene Air in 2021, but the second case involving this particular Airbus A330 aircraft. In October 2020, the AP-BNE faced another in-flight engine shut down when it was flying the same route from Karachi to Islamabad. At the time, after departure from Karachi, the pilots shut the left jet engine and diverted to KHI airport about 65 minutes after departure.
The more than 15 years old AP-BNE, equipped with two General Electric CF6-80E1A4 engines, joined the Serene Air fleet in August 2020. The airline leased the plane from an American aviation investment firm Carlyle Aviation Partners, the planespotters.com data showed. Before flying under the Pakistan flag, the aircraft has been carrying registration as EC-JPF and was operated by a Spanish air carrier Air Europa.