Japan Airlines fiery engine malfunction over Los Angeles

Dramatic engine malfunction caused the Japan Airlines flight to declare an emergency. Photo / Twitter, Glenn Beltz

An engine malfunction on a Tokyo-bound flight led to a short but spectacular flight for Japan Airlines JL15 on Friday, departing Los Angeles Airport. Flames were seen erupting from the right engine of the Boeing 777-300ER causing pilots to declare an emergency.

Engineering professor Glenn Beltz from UC Stanta Barbara was on site to witness the event. "Well you don't see this every day."

The plane bound for Haneda spent 45 minutes' burn off in a holding pattern before landing safely back at LAX.

The plane was able to offload fuel over the sea close to Catalina Island, to prepare to land.

Radarbox.com showed the service landed at 15:18 local time.

Following the emergency JL15 circled for 45 minutes before landing safely at LAX. Photo / RadarBox.com

In February Japanese transport authorities grounded 32 passenger jets belonging to Japan Airlines and All Nippon Airlines following an 777 engine fire over the United States.

The dramatic failure of the PW4000 family engine aboard a United Airlines flight from Denver to Honolulu caused the Japanese Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism to investigate the engines.

A Pratt & Witley 4000 family engine had suffered a similar problem aboard a Japan Airlines 777-200 to Haneda in December, according to the Ministry.

All 777 variants were removed from service on JAL's domestic routes in April.

It is not yet clear what happened on the 777-300 ER this weekend. However the General Electric jet engine was not one of the engines under investigation by the airline.