It looks like US might be short an A330 at least in the short term.
I have a friend on US 719 FCO-PHL today who was wondering why it was to be about 7 hours late out of Rome today, and it seems that 718 last night took returned to PHL after a short flight and probably a fuel dump over central NJ:
http://flightaware.com/live/flight/U...132Z/KPHL/KPHL
Per this thread on airliners.net, someone left a comm panel open upon departure (shouldn't there be some sort of sensor for this?) and the plane was hit by lightning. The panel being open may have created a more damaging path for the lightning, as the fuselage has holes from the strike.
US 1071 PHL-SJU and 1024 SJU-PHL today subbed an A321 for the 330, so clearly they put the Rome passengers on the "spare" A330 to FCO, which left at 3:24am.
Hopefully the damage is quickly repairable, but a caution for those heading to SJU in the coming days/weeks until this A330 is repaired: the 330 normally assigned to US 1071/1024 might be subbed for something else - I would have guessed a 757 or 767 rather than the 321 used today - but in any case those choosing these flights for the 330 might be disappointed.
