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Two Boeing 787 incidents raise concerns about jet
Tue, Jan 08 19:12 PM EST
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By Alwyn Scott
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Boeing Co's new 787 Dreamliner suffered its second mishap in two days at the same airport with the same airline, extending a series of problems that have dogged the jet for more than a month and notched up concern about the plane.
A fuel leak on Tuesday forced a 787 operated by Japan Airlines to cancel takeoff at Boston's Logan International Airport. On Monday, an electrical fire erupted in a different 787 also operated by Japan Airlines at the Boston airport.
No passengers or crew were injured, but both incidents brought out firefighters, and the National Transportation Safety Board on Tuesday bulked up the team investigating the fire.
The incidents were stark reminders of a string of teething problems that have hit the Dreamliner since July, prompting federal regulators to call for engine and fuel line inspections, among other measures.
Boeing said it was aware of the issue and was working with its customer. Boeing stock ended down nearly 2.7 percent at $74.13 Tuesday, following a 2 percent decline on Monday.
Many Wall Street analysts continued to rate the stock a buy or outperform, mainly because Boeing is delivering jets at a rapid pace and reaping the resulting revenue.
Some expressed concern, noting the potential for the combination of a fire and a fuel leak to affect the public perception of Boeing and the Dreamliner.
Carter Leake, an analyst at BB&T Capital Markets in Virginia, downgraded Boeing to "hold" from "buy" based on the fire alone, noting that fires are potentially lethal and electrical issues are tough to solve.
He and others stopped short of calling it a game changer for Boeing.
"We're getting to a tipping point where they go from needing to rectify problems to doing major damage control to the image of the company and the plane," said Richard Aboulafia, a defense and aerospace analyst with Teal Group, a consulting firm based in Fairfax, Virginia.
"While they delivered a large and unexpected number of 787s last year, it's possible that they should have instead focused on identifying glitches and flaws, rather than pushing ahead with volume production," he said.
Aboulafia said there is still no indication that the plane itself is flawed.
"It's just a question of how quickly they can get all the onboard technologies right, and whether or not the 787 and Boeing brands will be badly damaged," he said.
The fuel leak on Tuesday was noticed at about 12:25 pm ET, after the plane had left the gate in preparation for takeoff on a flight to Tokyo. About 40 gallons spilled, and the jet was towed back to the gate, where passengers disembarked, said Richard Walsh, a spokesman for state transportation authority Massport. The plane departed about four hours behind schedule, according to the flight tracking site Flightaware.com.
A Japan Airlines spokeswoman, Carol Anderson, confirmed that the plane later departed.
The fire on Monday occurred on a different 787 plane that had just arrived from Tokyo and whose 183 passengers and crew had departed.
The NTSB said Tuesday that a battery in the auxiliary power unit aboard the plane jet had suffered "severe fire damage" and that surrounding damage was limited to components and structures within about 20 inches. It said the power unit was operating when the fire was discovered.
The agency sent one investigator to the scene on Monday and added two more on Tuesday. The FAA, Boeing, the Japan Transport Safety Board and Japan Airlines are also investigating.
The NTSB said Tuesday's fuel leak would not warrant an investigation because there was no accident.
Boeing said it is cooperating with the investigations and it would be premature to discuss details since the fire probe is continuing.
"However, nothing we've seen in this case indicates a relationship to any previous 787 power system events, which involved power panel faults elsewhere in the aft electrical equipment bay," Boeing said, referring to the area where the fire occurred. "Information about the prior events has been shared with the NTSB and they are aware of the details."
Separately, the Wall Street Journal, citing a source, reported that United Airlines found improperly installed wiring in 787 electrical components associated with the auxiliary power unit, the same electrical system that caused the fire aboard a Japan Airlines 787 in Boston on Monday.
United spokeswoman Christen David said United inspected its 787s after the Boston fire incident, but she declined to discuss the findings, or to confirm the Journal report.
The fuel leak comes after the FAA in December ordered inspections of all 787s after fuel leaks were found on two aircraft operated by airlines. The leaks stemmed from incorrectly assembled fuel line couplings, which could result in loss of power or an engine fire, the FAA said.
Mechanical problems are not uncommon when new planes begin service and they often disrupt airline schedules, as they have done with United and Japan Airlines, experts said.
"I think we are dealing here with a situation where this aircraft is over-scrutinized for a number of reasons, including the birth difficulties," said Michel Merluzeau, managing partner at G2 Solutions, a boutique defense and aerospace consulting firm in Seattle.
The Dreamliner was delivered 3-1/2 years behind schedule.
"Don't get me wrong. A battery fire is a very, very serious event. Especially a lithium-ion battery," he added. "And we don't know what the problem is. But the 787s is still a very safe aircraft to fly."
Ken Herbert, an analyst with Imperial Capital, said he was concerned that some of the recent incidents could reflect issues with suppliers or product quality. And it might prompt airlines to take extra care with the plane. But he and other analysts cautioned against drawing conclusions until the cause -- and Boeing's response -- are known.
"The economics of this aircraft are still very favorable," Herbert said. "My outlook for the long-term success of the 787 certainly hasn't changed materially as a result of what's happened over the last few days."
(Reporting by Alwyn Scott. Additional reporting by Karen Jacobs in Atlanta; editing by Andrew Hay)
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U.S. launches safety review of 787 after recent issues
Fri, Jan 11 18:15 PM EST
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By Deborah Charles and Alwyn Scott
WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. government ordered a wide-ranging review of Boeing's latest passenger jet, the 787 Dreamliner, citing concern over a fire and other recent problems but insisting the plane was still safe to fly.
It was unclear how long the review will take or how much it will ultimately cost Boeing, but the company was concerned enough that it sent a top executive to a Washington press conference on the problem. Boeing shares fell 3 percent.
The 787 represented a leap in the way planes are designed and built, but the project was plagued by cost overruns and years of delays. Some have suggested Boeing's rush to get planes built after those delays resulted in the recent problems, a charge the company strenuously denies.
Either way, regulators said a thorough examination was needed to identify the root cause of the problems, including a fire on a parked 787 on Monday.
"There are concerns about recent events involving the Boeing 787. That is why today we are conducting a comprehensive review," Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told a news conference followed by more than 100 reporters around the world.
Those concerns notwithstanding, though, LaHood also maintained the plane was still airworthy.
"I believe this plane is safe and I would have absolutely no reservations about boarding one of these planes and taking a flight," he said.
While the FAA launched its review, Boeing customer All Nippon Airways had a launch of its own, initiating Dreamliner service between Tokyo and the Silicon Valley hub of San Jose. Passengers preparing to board shook off any suggestion they might be worried.
"Whenever there's a new plane there's some breaking in that comes with it. If the pilot's willing to get behind the stick and ride the plane, I have a great deal of confidence in the worthiness of the plane," said Marc Casto, 37, who runs a San Jose-based travel company.
Boeing shares fell 2.7 percent to $75 in late trading. Since December 4, when the first of the recent incidents took place, the stock is up 1.5 percent, underperforming a 4.3 percent gain in the S&P 500.
Much like the company's customers, who have generally stood behind it, analysts give the company good marks for its early response to the crisis.
"Boeing is doing a good job getting in front (as much as a company can) of the FAA situation. My view is that if the FAA deems this as a non-design issue, Boeing will be fine. If this is a design issue, it will be more troublesome because we need to pause the production to fix the design and then proceed," said Morningstar analyst Neal Dihora.
CHALLENGE FOR BOEING'S COMMERCIAL CHIEF
The review will focus on the 787's advanced electrical systems and cover their design, manufacture and assembly, the Federal Aviation Administration said.
The move comes on top of a separate probe by U.S. safety investigators into a battery fire that caused "serious damage" to an empty Japan Airlines 787 jet at Boston airport on Monday. Early findings of that probe are due next week.
The 787, the world's first mainly carbon-composite airliner, is Boeing's boldest effort to revolutionize commercial aviation by using new technology to cut fuel costs by 20 percent. Each lightweight jet has a list price of $207 million.
Airlines are pleased with the savings, and have so far given the plane their approval, both by ordering more than 800 jets and mostly sticking by it through the current spate of troubles.
After roughly 10 incidents on 787s in six weeks, one jet suffered a cracked cockpit window on Friday, while another had an oil leak.
"We also stand 100 percent behind the integrity of the 787 and the rigorous process that led to its successful certification and entry into service," Boeing CEO Jim McNerney said in a statement on Friday.
The review is a significant test for the recently appointed chief executive of Boeing's commercial airplanes division, Ray Conner, who attended Friday's news conference.
"The redundancies that we have put into this machine are phenomenal and the airplane performed perfectly in that respect. Now, we'd like to make sure that none of these happen again, and that's what we're going to try to do," Conner said.
Those complex systems that Conner referred to are among the advantages of the 787, but also complicate finding and solving problems, according to the director of MIT's Aeronautical Systems Laboratory.
"You now have the interdependencies that you didn't have before. The systems are much better when they work but they're harder to guarantee that they will work all the time and it's harder to predict what will happen when something fails," said R. John Hansman in an interview.
BOEING CONFIDENCE
As Boeing's 787 comes under review, the company is involved in difficult labor contract negotiations with its engineering union, which represents the workers who would be called upon to solve any problems with the Dreamliner.
On Friday, Boeing made a revised offer that it said would increase the pool of money available for raises.
Ray Goforth, executive director of the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace (SPEEA), declined to comment on the FAA review. He said Boeing's latest offer still included drastic cuts from the contract that expired in November.
The media storm about the 787 glitches echoes global publicity a year ago over wing cracks on the A380 superjumbo, built by Boeing's European rival Airbus.
The A380 has also been deemed safe to fly and few airlines have reported a dip in bookings, but the problems are expected to end up costing Airbus up to 500 million euros in repairs.
The 787 Dreamliner made its first commercial flight in late 2011 after a series of production delays put deliveries more than three years behind schedule. By the end of last year, Boeing had sold 848 Dreamliners. It now has 50 in service.
(Reporting by Kentaro Sugiyama, James Topham, Mari Saito, Mayumi Negishi and Maki Shiraki in TOKYO, Anurag Kotoky in NEW DELHI, Tim Hepher in PARIS, Deborah Charles and Alina Selyukh in WASHINGTON, Ernest Scheyder and Alwyn Scott in NEW YORK, Karen Jacobs in ATLANTA, Malathi Nayak in SAN JOSE and Aman Shah in Bangalore; Writing by Ian Geoghegan, Tim Hepher and Ben Berkowitz; Editing by Alex Richardson, Nick Zieminski, David Gregorio, Gary Hill)
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JAL's grounded Boeing Dreamliner leaks fuel in tests
Sun, Jan 13 15:05 PM EST
By James Topham and Alwyn Scott
TOKYO/SEATTLE (Reuters) - Japan Airlines Co (JAL) said on Sunday that a Boeing Co 787 Dreamliner jet undergoing checks in Tokyo following a fuel leak at Boston airport last week had leaked fuel during tests earlier in the day.
An open valve on the aircraft caused fuel to leak from a nozzle on the left wing used to remove fuel, a company spokeswoman said. The jet is out of service after spilling about 40 gallons (roughly 150 liters) of fuel onto the airport taxiway in Boston due to a separate valve-related problem.
In Boston, a different valve on the plane opened, causing fuel to flow from the center tank to the left main tank. When that tank filled up, it overflowed into a surge tank and out through a vent. The spill happened as the plane was taxiing for takeoff on a flight to Tokyo on January 8. It made the flight about four hours later.
The causes of both incidents are unknown, the JAL spokeswoman added. There is no timetable for the plane to return to service.
"We are aware of the event and are working with our customer," Boeing spokesman Marc Birtel said of the leak in Tokyo.
On Friday, the U.S. government ordered a wide-ranging review of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner, citing concern over a battery that caught fire on January 7, also on a JAL plane in Boston, and other problems. The government and Boeing insisted the passenger jet remained safe to fly.
The 787 represents the boldest bet Boeing has made on a new plane in more than a decade, and because the aircraft required billions to develop, much of the company's financial performance is riding on its success. Boeing is trying to double production to 10 jets a month this year to cash in on nearly 800 orders.
The eight airlines that operate the 50 jets delivered so far have expressed support for it, saying the mishaps are teething problems common with most new airplanes, and the 787's fuel savings make it an important addition to their fleets. JAL and local rival All Nippon Airways Co fly 24 Dreamliners.
The review follows a slew of incidents that have focused intense scrutiny on the new plane. While many of the issues that have dogged the 787 are typically considered routine, their occurrence in quick succession on an aircraft that incorporates major new technology and has not seen wide use yet has sparked concerns about safety.
In December, a 787 operated by United Airlines and bound from Houston to Newark, New Jersey, was forced to land in New Orleans after a warning light in the cockpit indicated a generator had failed.
Boeing later said a faulty circuit board produced in Mexico and supplied by UTC Aerospace Systems, a unit of United Technologies, had produced a false reading in the cockpit. A UTC Aerospace spokesman declined to comment.
Also in December, two other 787s suffered problems with electrical panels. The fire on January 7 started when a lithium-ion battery used in an auxiliary power system ignited while the plane was parked at the gate. It burned for about 40 minutes before firefighters put the flames out, and smoke entered the cabin. Passengers and crew had already left the aircraft.
On December 5, U.S. regulators said there was a manufacturing fault in 787 fuel lines and advised operators to make extra inspections to guard against engine failures.
Last week, the plane had seven reported incidents, ranging from the fire to a cracked cockpit window.
(Reporting by James Topham in Tokyo and Alwyn Scott in Seattle; Editing by Jeremy Laurence, Catherine Evans and Dale Hudson)
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FLASH: Smoke in ANA's Boeing 787 appeared in cockpit; all 129 passengers, 8 crew members were evacuated safely - Osaka airport spokesman
Dreamliner makes emergency landing in Japan: ANA
(AFP) – 5 minutes ago
TOKYO — A Boeing Dreamliner operated by All Nippon Airways made an emergency landing in the west of Japan on Wednesday, the airline said, with media reports saying smoke had been seen inside the aircraft.
"It made an emergency landing at Takamatsu because there was an error message during the flight," from Ube in the far west, bound for Tokyo, ANA spokeswoman Naoko Yamamoto said.
Television pictures showed emergency chutes deployed from the plane at the airport in Takamatsu, on Japan's fourth largest island of Shikoku.
Jiji Press reported smoke had been seen inside the cockpit. If confirmed, it would constitute yet another blow to the Dreamliner's reputation after more than a week of bad news.
ANA said 129 passengers and eight crew on board, with Jiji and broadcast NHK saying none was injured.
"It is true that the aircraft has recently seen a series of troubles," said the ANA spokesman. "But we cannot say if this has something in common with previous problems".
All Nippon Airways grounds all Dreamliners in fleet after emergency landing
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All Nippon Airways grounds all Dreamliners in fleet after emergency landing
All Nippon Airways has grounded all 17 Boeing 787 planes in its fleet for emergency inspections after a malfunction on board forced one of the Dreamliners to make an emergency landing at Takamatsu Airport in the west of Japan.
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India reviewing Dreamliner safety, no plans to ground aircraft: regulator
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NEW DELHI | Tue Jan 15, 2013 10:10pm EST
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India is reviewing the safety situation of Boeing Co Dreamliners and will also talk to component makers of the U.S. aircraft but there are no plans to ground the planes, the aviation regulator said on Wednesday.
"We are not having any problem with our Dreamliners. The problems we had earlier were fixed," Arun Mishra, Director General of Civil Aviation, told Reuters.
State-owned Air India owns 6 Dreamliners.
"We are reviewing the situation now ... we will have to talk to component companies," Mishra said.
(Reporting by Anurag Kotoky; Writing by Ranjit Gangadharan; Editing by Michael Urquhart)
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Japanese airlines ground Boeing 787s after emergency landing
Wed, Jan 16 01:52 AM EST
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By Mayumi Negishi and Tim Kelly
TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's two leading airlines grounded their fleets of Boeing 787s on Wednesday after one of the Dreamliner passenger jets made an emergency landing, heightening safety concerns over a plane many see as the future of commercial aviation.
All Nippon Airways Co said it was grounding all 17 of its 787s and Japan Airlines Co said it suspended all 787 flights scheduled for Wednesday. ANA said its planes could be back in the air as soon as Thursday once checks were completed. The two carriers operate around half of the 50 Dreamliners delivered by Boeing to date.
Wednesday's incident follows a series of mishaps for the new Dreamliner. The sophisticated plane, the world's first mainly carbon-composite airliner, has suffered fuel leaks, a battery fire, wiring problem, brake computer glitch and cracked cockpit window in recent days.
"I think you're nearing the tipping point where they need to regard this as a serious crisis," said Richard Aboulafia, a senior analyst with the Teal Group in Fairfax, Virginia. "This is going to change people's perception of the aircraft if they don't act quickly."
The 787 represented a leap in the way planes are designed and built, but the project was plagued by cost overruns and years of delays. Some have suggested Boeing's rush to get planes built after those delays resulted in the recent problems, a charge the company strenuously denies.
Both the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said they were monitoring the latest Dreamliner incident as part of a comprehensive review of the aircraft announced late last week.
ALARM TRIGGERED
ANA flight 692 left Yamaguchi Airport in western Japan shortly after 8 a.m. local time (2300 GMT Tuesday) bound for Haneda Airport near Tokyo, a 65-minute flight. About 18 minutes into the flight, at 30,000 feet, the plane began a descent. It descended to 20,000 feet in about four minutes and made an emergency landing 16 minutes later, according to flight-tracking website Flightaware.com.
A spokesman for Osaka airport authority said the plane landed in Takamatsu at 8:45 a.m. All 129 passengers and eight crew evacuated safely via the plane's inflatable chutes. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said 5 people were slightly injured.
At a news conference - where ANA's vice-president Osamu Shinobe bowed deeply in apology - the carrier said instruments on the flight indicated a battery error, triggering emergency warnings to the pilots. It said the battery in the forward cargo hold was the same type as one involved in a fire on another Dreamliner at a U.S. airport last week.
"There was a battery alert in the cockpit and there was an odd smell detected in the cockpit and cabin, and (the pilot) decided to make an emergency landing," Shinobe said.
Marc Birtel, a Boeing spokesman, told Reuters: "We've seen the reports, we're aware of the events and are working with our customer."
The Teal Group's Aboulafi said regulators could ground all 50 of the 787 planes now in service, while airlines may make the decision themselves. "They may want to protect their own brand images," he said.
UNDER REVIEW
Australia's Qantas Airways said its order for 15 Dreamliners remained on track, and its Jetstar subsidiary was due to take delivery of the first of the aircraft in the second half of this year. Qantas declined to comment further on the issues that have plagued the new lightweight, fuel-efficient aircraft.
India's aviation regulator said it was reviewing the Dreamliner's safety and would talk to parts makers, but had no plans to ground the planes. State-owned Air India has six of the aircraft in service and more on order.
"We are not having any problem with our Dreamliners. The problems we had earlier were fixed," Arun Mishra, Director General of Civil Aviation, told Reuters. "We are reviewing the situation now."
United Airlines, the only U.S. carrier currently flying the 787, said it was not taking any immediate action in response to the latest incident. "We are looking at what is happening with ANA and we will have more information tomorrow," a spokeswoman said.
Shares of Dreamliner suppliers in Japan came under pressure.
GS Yuasa Corp - which makes the plane's batteries - fell 4.5 percent, as did Toray Industries Inc, which supplies carbon fibre used in the plane's composites. Fuji Heavy Industries, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and IHI slid 2.5-3 percent on a benchmark Nikkei that was 2 percent lower. ANA shares slipped 1 percent.
PUBLIC CONFIDENCE
Japan's transport minister on Tuesday acknowledged that passenger confidence in the Dreamliner was at stake, as both Japan and the United States have opened broad and open-ended investigations into the plane after the recent incidents.
The 787 is Boeing's first new jet in more than a decade, and the company's financial fortunes are largely tied to its success. The plane offers airlines unprecedented fuel economy, but the huge investment to develop it coupled with years of delay in delivery has caused headaches for customers, hurt Boeing financially and created a delivery bottleneck.
Boeing has said it will at least break even on the cost of building the 1,100 new 787s it expects to deliver over the next decade. Some analysts, however, say Boeing may never make money from the plane, given its enormous development cost.
Any additional cost from fixing problems discovered by the string of recent incidents would affect those forecasts, and could hit Boeing's bottom line more quickly if it has to stop delivering planes, analysts said.
To date it has sold close to 850 of the planes to airlines around the world.
(Addtional reporting by Olivier Fabre, Kentaro Sugiyama, Mari Saito, Deborah Charles and Alwyn Scott; Writing by Ian Geoghegan; Editing by Paul Tait and Alex Richardson)
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Boeing Dreamliners grounded worldwide on battery checks
Thu, Jan 17 14:13 PM EST
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By James Topham and Alwyn Scott
TOKYO/SEATTLE (Reuters) - Airlines scrambled on Thursday to rearrange flights as regulators around the world joined the United States in grounding Boeing Co's 787 Dreamliner passenger jets while battery-related problems are investigated.
Poland's state-controlled LOT Airlines said it would seek compensation from Boeing for grounding its two planes. It expects delivery of three more Dreamliners by the end of March, but would only take them if the technical issues have been resolved, deputy chief Tomasz Balcerzak told a news conference.
The lightweight, mainly carbon-composite aircraft has been plagued by mishaps, raising concerns over its use of lithium-ion batteries. An All Nippon Airways Co Ltd domestic flight made an emergency landing on Wednesday after warning lights indicated a battery problem.
Boeing shares were up about 0.6 percent at $74.78 in afternoon New York Stock Exchange trading. For the first few weeks of the recent spate of incidents, the stock held up relatively well compared with the broader market, but has weakened recently as analysts grew wary of the costs Boeing might face.
"While it is entirely possible that the current battery issue is resolved in short order, it is also equally possible that the 787s current certification could be called into question," BB&T Capital Markets analyst Carter Leake wrote Thursday, cutting his rating on the stock to "underweight."
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) temporarily grounded Boeing's newest commercial airliner on Wednesday, saying carriers would have to demonstrate the batteries were safe before the planes could resume flying. It gave no details on when that might happen.
It is the first such action since the McDonnell Douglas DC-10 had its airworthiness certificate suspended following a deadly crash in Chicago in 1979, analysts said.
Boeing has sold about 850 of its new aircraft, with 50 delivered to date. Around half of those have been in operation in Japan, but airlines in India, South America, Poland, Qatar and Ethiopia, as well as United Airlines in the United States, are also flying the 787, which has a list price of $207 million.
By Boeing's accounting, the 787 program will not be considered profitable until the company has delivered 1,100 Dreamliners. As it stands, the plane accounts for a small portion of Boeing's revenue, given that it produces five of them a month versus 35 for the 737 model.
SCHEDULE GAPS
With most of that Dreamliner fleet now effectively out of action as engineers and regulators make checks, primarily of the plane's batteries and complex electronics systems, airlines are wrestling with gaps in their scheduling.
Japan Airlines Co Ltd said it canceled eight Dreamliner flights between Tokyo and San Diego until January 25, affecting some 1,290 passengers, and would switch aircraft for another 70 flights scheduled to fly the 787. Air India said it would use other planes on scheduled Dreamliner flights.
Qatar Airways, whose Chief Executive Akbar Al Baker had been one of the most outspoken critics of delays and technical problems with the 787, said his airline would ground its fleet of five aircraft. Ethiopian Airlines said its fleet of four Dreamliners had not experienced the same problems as other carriers, but that it would ground the planes nonetheless.
Keeping the 787s on the ground could cost ANA alone more than $1.1 million a day, Mizuho Securities calculated, noting the Dreamliner was key to the airline's growth strategy.
Regulators in Japan and India said it was unclear when the Dreamliner could be back in the air. A spokesman for the European Aviation Safety Agency said the region would follow the FAA's grounding order.
Boeing said in a statement it was confident the 787 was safe and it stood by the plane's integrity.
Passengers leaving United's flight 1426 in Houston, which took off from Los Angeles moments before the FAA announcement, reported an incident-free trip. "I fly over 100,000 miles a year," said Brett Boudreaux, a salesman from Lake Charles, Louisiana. "That was one of the most relaxing flights I've ever had. I hope they sort it out. It's a hell of a plane."'WORST THING' Scott Hamilton, an analyst at Leeham Co, an aerospace consulting firm in Seattle, said having a plane grounded "is about the worst thing that can happen to an airplane program." "If this goes beyond just a bad design of a battery and you have to redesign some systems leading to the battery and look at why didn't safeguards on this thing work, you get a ripple effect. They'll have more airplanes going out the door and they can't deliver them. So you build up inventory. Every day ... is an added day of delivery delays." Six new 787s, painted and apparently ready for delivery, were parked on the apron at Paine Field in Everett, Washington, adjacent to Boeing's 787 plant. Four more Dreamliners occupied the final assembly spots inside the factory. American Airlines, which just this week placed firm orders for 42 Dreamliners, pending U.S. Bankruptcy Court approval, said it was sticking to its plans. "We are in constant dialogue with Boeing. We believe the 787 is a great aircraft," Virasb Vahidi, chief commercial officer for American, said in an interview. SMOKE AND SOOT The Japan Transport Safety Board said the battery on the ANA flight that made the emergency landing was blackened, carbonized on the inside and weighed 5 kg less than normal, the Kyodo news agency reported. Representatives from the FAA, Boeing and the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board were due in Japan on Friday to inspect the plane. The use of new battery technology is among the cost-saving features of the 787, which Boeing says burns 20 percent less fuel than rival jetliners using older technology. The 787 represents a leap in aircraft design, but the project has been plagued by cost overruns and years of delays. Based on how regulators usually handle air safety, experts say U.S. authorities and Boeing will discuss the criteria for inspections on the Dreamliner. They would also set what fixes, if any, are needed and a timetable for those. Analysts say it is unclear how long that could take or how much it could cost, but some question whether Boeing can stick to its target of doubling 787 output to 10 a month by the end of this year. "It guarantees some throttling back in production. It's clear one of the problems was building planes before fully understanding the rhythm of production," Teal Group analyst Richard Aboulafia said. But aircraft industry sources say there was no immediate threat of airlines cancelling orders. "You aren't going to see cancellations," Leeham's Hamilton said, noting airlines have no alternative because rival models from Airbus are sold out and have years-long waiting lists. Airbus reported a 43 percent drop in orders for its planes last year, surrendering its crown as the world's largest aircraft maker to Boeing. The European manufacturer said it was confident of achieving the maiden flight of its A350 carbon-composite airliner by mid-year. The new plane will also use lithium-ion batteries, made by France's Saft Groupe SA. (Additional reporting by William Rigby, Tim Hepher, Andrea Shala-Esa, Erwin Seba, Karen Jacobs, Mari Saito, Anurag Kotoky, Karolina Slowikowska, Adrian Krajewski and Reuters bureaux; Writing by Ian Geoghegan and Ben Berkowitz; Editing by Alex Richardson, Maureen Bavdek and Andre Grenon) ====================== Boeing may do 787 certification flight on Friday: source Thu, Apr 04 18:23 PM EDT WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Boeing Co may carry out a certification test flight of its grounded 787 Dreamliner with a revamped battery system on Friday, a key step toward returning the state-of-the-art aircraft to flight, a U.S. government official said on Thursday. The official, who was not authorized to speak on the record, said the certification test could be carried out on Friday if all remaining ground-based tests were completed on Thursday. "They're not quite there yet," said the official, adding that it might not be clear until early Friday if the certification flight could take place. Boeing declined to confirm the timing of the flight. "As a matter of long-standing policy Boeing does not provide advance notice of flight test activities until we have filed flight test plans," Boeing spokesman Marc Birtel told Reuters when asked about a possible test flight on Friday. Boeing typically files a flight plan a few hours before the plane takes off. All 50 787s in service worldwide were grounded in January after the airplane's lithium-ion batteries overheated on two separate aircraft, one on the ground in Boston and a second during a flight in Japan. The certification flight is part of a series of tests to show whether measures Boeing has devised to fix the battery problems work as intended. A preparation flight on March 25 "went according to plan," Boeing said. It's still unknown what caused the two batteries to overheat, and the National Transportation Safety Board is investigating. But Boeing came up with measures it says make the battery safe. It encased the battery in a steel box, changed the circuitry of the battery charger and added a titanium venting tube to expel heat and fumes outside the plane. Once Boeing completes its testing, the Federal Aviation Administration will review the test data and decide whether to certify the fix and return the plane to service. Airlines have been barred from using the plane since it was grounded in January, and Boeing has been barred from delivering 787s, though it continues to build the plane. (Reporting By Andrea Shalal-Esa and Alwyn Scott; Editing by Gary Hill, Bernard Orr)
