New Woes for the 787
The newly-minted Boeing 787 fleet is grounded after planes experienced battery “thermal runaway”issues, either fires or severe overheating. As a result, on Jan. 16 the FAA grounded the fleet in the US following the earlier grounding of the Japanese fleet. The Wall Street Journal (Koh, Takahashi, Ostrower) reported on January 17, “The Federal Aviation Administration ordered the immediate temporary halt of US Boeing Co.'s 787 Dreamliner flights on Wednesday, saying it requires a ‘corrective action plan’ before flights can resume…”
Reuters (Rigby) reported that “The slow progress of investigations into battery problems on Boeing Co.'s 787 Dreamliner jets suggest the new plane could be grounded for months, raising fears that the financial hit to Boeing will be greater than had been initially predicted.” The article raises fears of order cancellations if the grounding extends beyond six months.
This is the latest issue in a program plagued with delays centered around groundbreaking new technology. According to the AP (Freed, Lowy), "The 787 is the first airliner to make extensive use of lithium-ion batteries to help power its energy-hungry electrical systems. The batteries charge faster and can be better molded to space-saving shapes compared with other airplane batteries." The Seattle Times noted, "Lithium-ion batteries are state of the art, producing the most energy in the lightest package at an acceptable price. But they have had problems and continue to challenge engineers to manage the temperature generated in their chemical reactions, particularly as larger versions are produced for vehicles and now airplanes.” The New York Times (Drew, Mouawad, subscription publication) reported, "In a conference call … with reporters, Boeing's chief engineerfor the 787, Mike Sinnett, said that the company had long been aware of possible problems with lithium-ion batteries, but it had built numerous redundant features to keep any problems with the batteries from threatening the plane inflight…..the batteries had not had any problems in 1.3 million hours of flight, and that Boeing was trying to understand what had caused the problems." Sinnet"said that if the lithium-ion batteries started a fire, it would be nearly impossible to put out because the batteries produce oxygen when burning.
The Wall Street Journal (Michaels) reported that the issues with the Boeing Dreamliner show the difficulties of mastering new technology like the composite materials used in the plane and its lithium ion batteries.
Boeing to Continue Making 787s
According to company spokesman Doug Alder, Jr., in a communication to AeroDef on Jan 25, 2013, “Production of 787s continues. We will not deliver 787s until the FAA approves a means of compliance with their recent Airworthiness Directive concerning batteries and the approved approach has been implemented,” he stated.
The Las Vegas Sun (AP) reported that “Boeing currently builds five 787s per month.It hasn't delivered any since Jan. 3, before the plane started experiencing a spate of problems that also included fuel and oil leaks, a cracked cockpit window and a computer glitch that erroneously indicated a brake problem.
Boeing spokeswoman Lori Gunter said no deliveries had been scheduled during that time. She declined to discuss planned deliveries.
Regardless of delivery schedules, it's cheaper for Boeing to build the planes and then go back and fix them than it is to shut down production.
Boeing is providing an on-going blog for updates http://www.boeing.com/commercial/787family/statements.html.
To keep up to date with media coverageof the situation, please visit http://tinyurl.com/BoeingInvestigation