Italy’s ITA Airways weighs lawsuit over Pratt & Whitney engine faults1

© Reuters.

By Allison LampertRIO DE JANEIRO, June 7 (Reuters) - Italy’s ITA Airways will decide within the next eight weeks whether to sue aerospace supplier RTX’s Pratt & Whitney due to engine problems that have grounded almost 20% of its fleet of 80 aircraft, the carrier’s CEO told Reuters on Sunday. Hundreds of A320neo planes, the latest version of the Airbus single-aisle jets, have been grounded globally. This has been partly due to long waiting times for engine inspections and repairs, and after a manufacturing problem at Pratt & Whitney put pressure on the output of the GTF engines in the Airbus planes.“It’s imminent,” Joerg Eberhart, CEO of ITA Airways said on the sidelines of a global gathering of top airline executives in Rio de Janeiro.

“We will have to decide within the next six to eight weeks.” RTX did not immediately reply to a request for comment.