Boeing 787 news

[RoMax]

Air Canada currently has 37 787-8's on order (the first one will be delivered in March 2014 btw, with a total of seven or eight in 2014, replacing 767's which will move to Rouge).
But they are about to shift a part of their order to the bigger 787-9 and the options the airline has for the 787, will eventually be turned into firm orders for the 787-10 and probably no more -8's or -9's. At least, that's what is being told internally.

[sn26567]

The Boeing 787-10 launch is foreseen at the Paris Air Show 2013; United Airlines, Air Lease Corp., Singapore Airlines and British Airways are expected to be the launch customers.

In fact, United is in talks with both Boeing and Airbus for their largest new jets: they will modify a 2009 order to take 25 wide-body A350-1000s instead of the smaller -900 variant as once planned. United also will convert options for a couple dozen A350s and Dreamliners into firm orders, with the Boeing jets being the new 787-10X model.

[RoMax]

Qatar Airways is also set to announce more 787 orders in Paris. Though that may be for the 787-9 and not the -10 as most other 787 orders in Paris will probably represent.
Boeing is 110 firm orders away from the 1000 mark, with an official 787-10 launch expected very soon, that mark will probably be reached in the 'near future'.

Seems like Paris is going to be a great airshow for next generation widebody sales (A350 and 787) after some calmer editions in both 787 and A350 sales. Airbus expects quite some A350 orders, including several A350-1000 commitments (United seems a certainty already). And Boeing is expected to gather quite some 787-10 orders besides some smaller orders for the other versions.

Boeing also just delivered another 787 to Qatar (number 60 in total) and it was flown straight to Le Bourget for the airshow. The other 787 in Paris is one of Air India (LN90) which will do flying displays. This aircraft is still owned by Boeing, contrary to the Qatar aircraft.

[sn26567]

Boeing announces that the 787 is set to fly every day at 15:30 Paris time (Monday through Friday) during the Paris Air Show 2013. (Incidentally, the BA A380 will fly Monday at 10:00 as the show opener).

[sn26567]

Two United Airlines Boeing 787 Dreamliners have been diverted from intercontinental flights in three days because of an oil-related problem.

Flight UA125 from London Heathrow to Houston diverted to Newark, New Jersey due to a low oil indication yesterday (Thursday 20 June). The aircraft landed normally and without incident around 2:15 p.m. local time and customers were put on other flights.

On Tuesday (18 June), a United 787 on its way to Tokyo from Denver was diverted to Seattle after an indication of a problem with an oil filter in an engine. That plane also landed without incident.

Boeing said the two incidents were not related. General Electric, the manufacturer of the United 787 GEnx engines, did not comment.

Full story from Reuters

[RoMax]

Rolls Royce delivered the engines for the first 787-9 to Boeing. These should be the Package C engines, being 1% more fuel efficient as the current engines on the 787.

According to RR, their Trent 1000 engines have completed about 50,000 flying hours since the introduction with ANA late 2011. Operating with a dispatch reliability of 99,9%, according to RR the Trent 1000 shows the best reliability figures ever for a widebody engine entering airline service.

By 2016 the Trent 1000-TEN will enter service, this one will be 3% more fuel efficient as the current engines used on the 787 and can be fitted to all 3 types of the 787.

http://www.rolls-royce.com/news/press_r ... flight.jsp

[sn26567]

If you want to know in real time which 787 is currently en-route, Boeing has set up a special website:

http://flighttracker.newairplane.com/

Nice !

[sn26567]

Boeing will compensate LOTe for 787s

A Polish government official says Boeing will offer compensation to the national airline for the months-long grounding of its two 787 planes.

Deputy Treasury Minister Rafal Baniak said Monday that the grounding had cost over 100 million zlotys (€ 24 million) in lost flights alone. Boeing is to make a compensation offer in July.

LOT, which is struggling financially, had hoped that the fuel-efficient 787 would improve its earnings.

[RoMax]

As they (will) compensate about every influenced user that asks for compensation.
But LOT saw the 787 as their holy grail, but they have to realise this is not thé solution for their problems. Without the groundings it may have took a bit longer before they needed fresh money and had to take the decision to cut their whole fleet, but with or without 787 that moment was nearing.

[cnc]

the 787 program is a disaster...
operating liabilities are not how it should be so far

[RoMax]

operating liabilities are not how it should be so far

ANA, JAL, United and LAN (of which I remember) publicly commented that the 787 performs better than what they and Boeing predicted before delivery of these aircraft. Yes they still lack from what was the plan, but that's totally expected. Reliability may seem a disaster, but except for the grounding it's still higher than with many other widebody introductions (the performance was better than that of the 777 before the grounding). Btw, even Qatar Airways (Al Baker is, besides MOL about the most complaining ceo in the industry) is not complaining except for the big delays.

What I ment in my previous post is that even with 787's performing above their designed specifications, it still wouldn't be enough to keep LOT alive in they way they currently operate. Yes they can operate more efficiently with the 787 and yes the 787 is more attractive thanks to it's better interior compared to their 767's, but at the same time there are other huge costs involved with operating this brand new aircraft. I don't know if it was such a good choice of LOT to be such an early Dreamliner client.

[cnc]

i doubt UA made a recent statement about how happy and reliable the 787 is
LH's 747's seem to have a lot less problems.

[RoMax]

i doubt UA made a recent statement about how happy and reliable the 787 is
LH's 747's seem to have a lot less problems.

UA made that statement before the grounding I believe (but it may have been one of the others, I tought it was UA).
LH's 748i's are doing very well on reliability, but they do lack performance (compared to what was planned), tough also that's improving like with the 787.

Btw, the 787-9 is still planned to be right on it's design weight as from the first frame. So let's hope reliability also shows better results...

[RoMax]

The 'real birds' are not helping either:
http://avherald.com/h?article=46463270&opt=0

[Bottie]

The 'real birds' are not helping either:
http://avherald.com/h?article=46463270&opt=0

Nice repair-charter

[RoMax]

Nice repair-charter

It certainly is

Btw, the first 787 for British Airways will soon be delivered, maybe today with delivery flight on Thursday or Friday. The first 787's for Hainan and Norwegian should be delivered very soon as well.

Last time I saw an overview, there were 63 Dreamliners delivered (including already 6 this month):
- ANA: 20
- JAL: 9
- Air India: 7
- United: 6
- Qatar: 6
- Ethiopian: 4
- LOT: 4
- LAN: 3
- Thomson: 3
- China Southern: 1

And soon Aeromexico, British Airways, Norwegian and Hainan will join the list of 787 owners.

[RoMax]

At least one 787 for BA is about to land in LHR (or just landed), I'm not sure about the second one though, it should follow very soon.

Also China Southern and Hainan Airlines are very close to taking their 787's (the second for CZ, first for HU). Hainan could take delivery first, but apperently the Chinese want China Southern to take delivery of their second 787 before Hainan is allowed to take their first one to China... Oh well it's China and Hainan is a private company, so no real suprise... Hainan is about to start 787 operations already on July 3.

[sn26567]

At least one 787 for BA is about to land in LHR (or just landed), I'm not sure about the second one though, it should follow very soon.

G-ZBJB on final approach at LHR:



and in front of LHT Tower



BA has disclosed the first destinations to be flown by the 787: Toronto from 1 September and Newark from 1 October.

The pilots will be trained on European flights to Stockholm before flying transcontinental. Other suggestions which have not been confirmed included MAN, NCL, EDI. (For the A380 it will be Frankfurt).

[RoMax]

British Airways yesterday, Norwegian today:
http://www.flightglobal.com/news/articl ... 87-387757/

[Vleispyp]

the 787 program is a disaster...
operating liabilities are not how it should be so far

The airplane got grounded over several months due to this battery problem and got "fixed" (I don't agree with the Boeing repair, don't get me wrong). Once it was released to service by the FAA we've had a few glitches with the airplane, oil related, not battery.

When airplanes sit for a long time (like the Dreamliner during its grounding) they develop problems. These glitches will slowly disappear once the airplane is back on a normal schedule.