Boeing 787 Dreamliner

Tag Archives for Boeing 787 Dreamliner.

787 situation gets more serious

The 787 grounding has now been in place for a month and it looks like Boeing faces months more. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has indicated that it will be weeks  before it identifies the causes of the thermal runaway in the 787’s lithium-ion-batteries. Boeing conducted a second test flight of the 787 from Seattle’s Boeing field across Washington state last Monday for an  hour and 29 minutes. The flight was uneventful. Boeing advised that the flight data is being analysed but did not release any details. Boeing is basically guaranteed not to be able to…

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787 still grounded

It has now been over a week since the 787 flew. For the eight carriers that have the 787 in service, another week of no revenue from the plane. The National Transportation Safety Board investigators have not yet found the reason for the  January 7 fire at Boston airport. U.S. safety investigators ruled out last Sunday that the cause came from was  excess voltage and expanded their investigation to look at the battery’s charger and the jet’s auxiliary power unit. One of the most chilling learnings for me was that Securaplane, the company that makes the charger suffered millions…

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The 787 Battery Fire: Step by step

On January 7, 2013  a JAL Boeing 787 landed at Boston Logan airport. It had flown as JAL008 from Tokyo Narita.  The 787 had logged only 22  pressurisation cycles (basically the number of times it had been in the air) and 169 flight hours. It parked at the gate at 1006am local time. All 183 passengers and 11 crew left the plane. At 1032am  the Cleaning and maintenance crew noticed smoke in cabin. Three minutes later, a mechanic noted flames coming from APU battery in the aft (rear) electronics bay. The  Airport Rescue & Fire Fighting were notified  at 1037am and the fire…

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All 787s grounded-airline by airline

After a series of highly publicised problems including an ANA emergency landing on Wednesday 16 January, all 50 of the 787s across the world have been grounded. On Wednesday 16th January, 2013, US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) ordered the grounding of all US-registered 787s and recommended other jurisdictions do the same: As a result of an in-flight, Boeing 787 battery incident earlier today in Japan, the FAA will issue an emergency airworthiness directive (AD) to address a potential battery fire risk in the 787 and require operators to temporarily cease operations.  Before further flight, operators of U.S.-registered, Boeing 787 aircraft must demonstrate to…

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My Top Airlines for 2012

This  last year, I flew 121 times for a total distance of  331,127km (205,753 mi). This is eight and a quarter times around the earth. I was inside planes for a whopping 19 days of the year. Some airlines made my time with them a delight – and some made it not so fun. I rate each flight I take for every factor from Booking to Check-in to deplaning. and keep a tally of my rating using Flightmemory.com.  The scores averaged out give me the ranking of flights, airlines and airports.  I have placed my score for each airline…

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Norwegian selling 787 Tickets

Norwegian Air Shuttle  began selling tickets for their New York JFK and Bangkok Boeing 787 services on Thursday November 8 for flights from May 30th, 2013. Some very cheap seats were available -and they were selling fast. The carrier will fly between Oslo (Norway) and Stockholm (Sweden) three times a week. Seats on Norwegian’s 787 will be nine across 3-3-3 in economy class with a 31″ pitch. The airline is also introducing a Premium Cabin on the 787,  configured six across 2-2-2 with a 46″ pitch. Up to now, the airline has been all one class.…

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787 Air India door failure

Much reporting but no details about the non closing cargo door of Air India’s second Boeing 787 delivered last month. Registration:  VTADN.  The reports are saying that the front cargo door ‘disintegrated’. The airline is saying nothing hit the plane. They are waiting for a spare to arrive.  Boeing, of course, is investigating the matter. There were some suggestions that because the plane is made of composites, this was the issue.

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ANA adds EVEN MORE 787s

ANA (All Nippon Airways) is purchasing  eleven more Boeing 787-9 aircraft valued at $USD3.3 billion) for delivery between 2018 and  2021, the carrier said in a statement. ANA  plans to switch its Narita to Seattle service to 787 aircraft from 1st October and between Tokyo and Beijing from 28th October.   Tokyo Narita to San Jose, California will follow in January 2013. When added with existing orders, these purchases bring ANA’s Dreamliner fleet to 36 B787-8s and 30 B787-9s. The 787-8 is the base model of the 787 family: 57 metres long (186 feet),  a wingspan of…

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LOT announces 787 services

At last a European carrier gets their turn. LOT Polish Airlines has announced that the carrier’s inaugural Boeing 787 service from Warsaw to Chicago will be on January 16, 2013. This will be followed closely by Warsaw to Toronto on February 1 and to New York  JFK on February 3. LOT Polish Airlines will launch Boeing 787 service to Beijing a month later, on March 3. LOT is offering 252 seats all with individual entertainment in three classes of service on the new aircraft. This compares with JAL’s 186 seats, ANA’s 216, United with 219 and Ethiopian’s 270 seats. Elite Club (business…

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LAN gets 787

Boeing keeps churning out the 787s!  LAN Airlines, received delivery of the first 787 Dreamliner  yesterday. The new plane arrived in Santiago, Chile September 1st, making it the first airline in the Americas to receive the new airplane. LAN is one of my favourite airlines. I have always found them a delight to travel with. LAN has ordered 32 planes that will be phased in over the next 10 years at a cost of almost five billion dollars. The destinations the 787 will fly to during its first year of operation will be Santiago, Buenos Aires, Lima, Los Angeles,…

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