• Home
• /
• Aviation

787 Test Flight on Track before Year-end: Boeing Chief

DUBAI — Boeing said on Monday it was on track for the first test flight of its much-delayed breakthrough aircraft, the 787 Dreamliner, by the end of 2009.

“We are on schedule for 787’s first test flight before the year end and do not expect any last minute surprises,” said Boeing chairman Jim McNerney said on the sidelines of the Dubai Airshow 2009.

The beleaguered 787 programme, delayed six times already due to technical glitches and manufacturing woes, will also see its first plane delivery by the last quarter of 2010.

The development of the 250- to 330-seat aircraft, now running almost two years behind its original schedule, has also resulted in the cancellation of 17 aircraft orders. “We lost 17, and still have 840 Dreamliners on order,” McNerney said.

The 787 order alone amounts to a $148 billion backlog for Boeing, which is expecting to deliver a total of 480 aircraft in 2009 despite strikes and technical snags that plagued the Chicago-based company for the past two years.

McNerney said one the seven key strategies to drive Boeing into the future is “to get the 787 out the door and putting its game-changing innovation into the hands of our customers.”

Boeing has made substantial progress in recent months, achieving both technical and schedule milestones, he said. “These developments move us to the eve of a historic flight test programme that will begin before the end of the year,” he said.

Speaking to Khaleej Times at the end of a media roundtable session, McNerney said there was no need to have a rethinking on the part of Boeing in its stance against developing a superjumbo to match rival Airbus 380.

“We continue to believe that our upgraded jumbo, 787-8 will have a larger market as it fits more airlines requirements,” he said.

Aviation analysts believe that although Airbus has taken the crown away from Boeing as maker of the biggest commercial passenger jet with the A380, Boeing has been able to retain first place among freighters as Airbus, lacking customers, halted work on the freighter version as it concentrated on the passenger A380. Boeing has 78 orders for the 747-8 Freighter. At 250 feet, 2 inches, the 747-8F’s fuselage is 18 feet, 4 inches longer than the 747-400 Freighter. Boeing says the stretch will increase revenue cargo volume by 16 per cent.

Boeing officially launched 747-8 family of aircraft programme on 14 November 2005. The aircraft family includes to versions the 747-8 Intercontinental passenger airplane and the 747-8 Freighter airplane also known as the 747-8F.

McNerney said the new aircraft would feature technologies taken from Boeing 787 Dreamliner programme. Among those technologies to be inserted into the 747-8 programme highlights low emissions, fuel-efficient GEnx engine provided by General Electric.Besides the 747-8 will offer lower trip costs, lower noise emissions, an upgraded flight deck and an improved wing.

The 747-8 Intercontinental passenger airplane will be stretched 3.6 metre compared to the 747-400 to accommodate 34 additional seats in a typical three-class configuration. The Intercontinental will have a range of 14,815 km and will feature the new Boeing Signature Interior. It will offer 21 per cent more lower-hold revenue cargo volume than the 747-400 and cost about 8 per cent less per seat mile to operate. According to Boeing, compared to the A380, it will offer 22 per cent lower trip costs.

Reaffirming Boeing’s commitment to the Middle East, McNerney said along with the region’s airlines his company had successfully made the region a global air transport hub.

“We have delivered more than 400 jets to operators in the Middle East over the past 40 years. Emirates, for example, are the largest operator of 777s in the world. Boeing Business Jets, or BBJ, has a long-standing presence in the region where its orders represent in excess of 30 per cent of the total for BBJ and VIP airplanes,” McNerney.

issacjohn@khaleejtimes.com