Thursday, August 23, 2012

Busy day for 787s at Everett

Boeing sent up 4 customer ready 787s for test flights including an aircraft for Air India that is currently at Boeing Charleston.  The four airplanes that flew were:

ZA237 (LN 46, VT-ANI)
ZA118 (LN 67, JA813A) - making a C-1 flight
ZA119 (LN 69, JA814A) - making a B-1 flight
ZA461 (LN 58, A7-BCB) - making a Boeing test flight and then later a C-1 flight

Given the ZA461 and ZA118 both have customer flights, both these airplanes are very, very close to being ready for delivery, perhaps being delivered this month.  ZA119 for ANA made its first flight but had to return to Everett early due to an unspecified problem during the test flight.  ZA237 did a flight that lasted a couple of hours but it is not known if it was customer flight or a Boeing flight. Air India's 787 though are ready for delivery but the airline isn't ready.  Still now word on when the airline will take delivery but I don't think that anything should be read into this one test flight just yet.  IF there are more test flights (customer flights) with the other 2 787s that are ready as well as B-1 flights of the other two Charleston built Dreamliners then that may be an indication of something happening.

Finally the first production Dreamliner to enter assembly is finally being flown to Japan tonight.  ZA100 (LN 7, JA803A) was temporarily grounded by an unknown maintenance issue.  The issue has been resolved and this aircraft which needed the most work is finally being sent home.  ANA accepted delivery on August 20th.




4 comments:

greg said...

Both ZA118 and ZA119 are LN67?

(the robot buster generates too fuzzy words to read; replace it!)

TurtleLuv said...

fly ln7, fly!! :)

something very cathartic about seeing these early builds enter service after sitting around so long.

thx for the update.

HK Expat said...

Next few moves to look out for:
- CSN/43 or QAT 64 move onto the flightline
- ETH/71 B1 flight followed by ferry to Texas for painting
- LAN/74 into the Paine paint hangar
- ETH/75 out of the Assembly Line
- JAL/27 B1 flight
Cheers
A

HI Flyer said...

According to this article from The Econimic Times, AI is expected to take delivery of it's first Dreamliner on Tuesday, 8/28.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/transportation/airlines-/-aviation/first-boeing-787-dreamliner-expected-on-tuesday/articleshow/15637319.cms?#