West Sea Coast Guard Achieves Korea's 'First' Successful High-Difficulty Airplane Engine Replacement Operation

Collaboration with Private Companies... Achieving Maintenance Technology Acquisition and Budget Savings

The West Sea Regional Coast Guard successfully completed the first high-difficulty airplane engine replacement in Korea. (Photo by West Sea Regional Coast Guard)

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Seo Young-seo] The Seohae Regional Maritime Police Agency (Chief Yoon Byung-doo) has succeeded in the first high-difficulty airplane engine replacement in Korea.

On the 28th, according to the Seohae Maritime Police Agency, they perfectly carried out high-difficulty tasks such as intermediate maintenance (disassembly and reassembly) of the CN-235 airplane engine and engine installation/removal (replacement).

Intermediate maintenance of the CN-235 airplane engine requires precise technology. For this reason, the designated company, Spain's ITP AERO, disassembled and reassembled the engine over four months.

The engine installation/removal was conducted by the Muan Aviation Unit over 20 days. Previously, engine replacements were performed by overseas manufacturers or maintenance-certified companies, but this time, the replacement was carried out through collaboration between the Muan Aviation Unit maintenance team and a domestic company (Goam Ace).

In particular, collaboration with the domestic company shortened the two-week downtime caused by the overseas maintenance company's technician quarantine, contributed not only to securing the maritime police's own maintenance technology but also to revitalizing domestic aviation maintenance companies.

Moreover, by departing from the conventional maintenance unit price contract commonly used in the aviation maintenance field and introducing a general competitive bidding method, they achieved a budget saving of about 600 million KRW.

Based on this collaboration, the maritime police plan to strengthen education and reinforce facilities so that they can independently perform engine installation/removal work in the future.

Park Je-su, head of the Seohae Maritime Police Aviation Unit, said, "The maritime police's first fixed-wing maintenance hangar is scheduled to be built in Muan, Jeonnam, in 2026," adding, "The success of this engine installation/removal collaboration will be an important foundation for securing our own technical personnel."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.