New Delhi: A GoAir A320neo aircraft headed to Chandigarh from Mumbai on Sunday had to abandon its journey mid-air due to engine vibrations, stoking  sparkling worries approximately  the Pratt and Whitney (P&W)-made engines mounted on the Airbus planes.

The aircraft, which was carrying 169 passengers, faced “a technical glitch” and “after turn-back the aircraft landed safely at Mumbai airport”, the budget airline said in a statement. “The aircraft is being inspected and rectified by the GoAir engineering team.”

GoAir said it is making alternative flight arrangements for the affected passengers.

Meanwhile, Arun Kumar, head of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA),  stated  the regulator will conduct a thorough research into the incident.

He said DGCA will be intensifying exams on such P&W engines because the quantity of A320neo aircraft engines with potential safety problems has risen to greater than 130 in India.

India’s civil aviation minister, Hardeep Singh Puri, had earlier put the figure at 110.

“These are preventive checks. If we don’t do these, there may be problems mid-air,” he said. The regulator is yet to decide whether some aircraft would need to be grounded.

Kumar said DGCA would determine in mid-January whether to grant IndiGo more time—beyond  the current 31 January deadline—before the regulator starts ordering a few  A320neo planes to be grounded. The affected planes have continued to fly,  whilst  their  repair work is being done seeing that they have two engines.

“The not-so-good news is that it will take more time than envisaged owing to logistical challenges,” Kumar said. “About the exact extension of time, we will be able to make a proper assessment sometime in the middle of January after taking a holistic view.”