March 8, 2009

An Air Namibia Airbus A340-300, registration V5-NME performing flight SW-285 from Windhoek (Namibia) to Frankfurt/Main (Germany) with 184 passengers and 15 crew, was climbing out from Windhoek, when a loud noise was heard, prompting the flight crew to suspect a bird strike. The crew received no abnormal indications from their instruments and continued the flight to Frankfurt, where the airplane landed safely and on schedule.

Air Namibia reported, that a subsequent bird strike inspection in Frankfurt performed by LH technics brought no findings. Power runs however revealed high exhaust gas temperatures (EGT) and sudden stalls on engine #4 prompting engine repairs.

The return flight SW-286 of May 9th was delayed to the next day due to the inspection and repair.

V5-NME suffered two more incidents on March 10th and 12th connected to this incident.

On March 10th the aircraft V5-NME was to fly from Frankfurt to Windhoek as the regular flight SW-286 (the other A340 V5-NMF had departed earlier the day also as SW-286 to resume the delayed flight SW-286 of May 9th), but could not depart due to a technical issue. The flight had to be delayed to the next day.