Sister airlines Cape Air and Nantucket cancelled flights aboard their 49 Cessna 402s through Friday as the result of three engine failures but expected its Northeast operations to return to normal by press time. Its Caribbean operation will take slightly longer but should return early next week. "The response from passengers has been overwhelmingly positive," reported Cape Air's Michelle Haynes. "For an airline used to getting passengers to their destinations, this has been very hard on us."
Mechanics found an abnormally quick wear pattern involving the counterweight on the crankshaft on the engines that had in-flight shut downs, although they did not find a definitive cause to the failures. The airline notified the Federal Aviation Administration about the pattern as well as plans to ground its aircraft until they can be inspected. The cancellations impacted between 2,000 and 3,000 passengers bound from Boston to Hyannis, Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket, New Bedford, Providence and Provincetown. Alternate transportation – including bus and ferry tickets – were being arranged for passengers. Two of the engine failures occurred over Memorial Day weekend while the third occurred on June 12 impacted a Logan-bound flight. After 18 years of operation with no incidents, CEO DanWolf said the groundings were done in an abundance of caution.