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The Boeing 787 Dreamliner just can’t catch a break. After all of the planes were grounded following some seriously troubling melting batteries, the US’s Federal Aviation Authority has been taking a look into what exactly went wrong. They’ll take their time though; it could be years before the birds are back in the sky.
US Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told reporters that the investigation has to be slow going, saying “We’re not feeling any pressure. We’re going to get this right. We have to get this right.” And he’s not wrong; melting batteries are no joke. So far there are no real leads on what the problem really was, and so we’re no closer to being able to solve it reliably. If you can’t figure out what it was, you have to fix everything it could have been.
There’s no deadline for the investigation, and according to the retired aviation investigations chief at the US National Transportation Safety Board, Tom Haueter, that means it could take years. After all, the evidence is all destroyed by fire. The investigation doesn’t have to be complete before the birds fly again, but obviously everyone would be more comfortable if it was. It could be a long, rocky, grounded road ahead for the Dreamliner. [Bloomberg]
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This is good news for the UK, Airbus uses British engines.
The 787 uses Trent-1000 engines from Rolls Royce or engines from GE.
So it’s still bad news.
Couldn’t care less about GE or Boeing. Let’s hope RR have something in their contract that protects them from losing moneys.
and all of Airbus’ wings and systems are designed/built in the UK too
Surely they’ll have to test fly one of these birds just to see if they can recreate the problem.
I think it’s unlikely they will ever try to recreate a fire on board an aircraft in flight. Fire is the single most dangerous situation an aircraft can face short of losing a wing or tail.
I heard they were sending one up this week and as early as today (4th Feb) as a test aircraft. Not sure it’s going to be as long as you think.
The Boeing engineers are going on strike soon so even if they find the fault they won’t be able to fix it until the strike ends.
So it’s not just a case of crappy QA on the batteries?
As I said above, they are due to do a flight using the same battery array but the battery will be in an isolation box system so that should it catch fire it can be contained.
I said earlier that the flight will be today, I’ve just heard it will more than likely be pushed back by a couple of days, but is still expected to take place this week.
3 more weeks is the current expected grounding time.
Another damaging result of having Bush in power for 8 years. He replaced the FAA with his own people who stopped regulating and instead acted to help Boeing push the Dreamliner through as quickly as possible.
There are many new and normal use untested features in this aircraft and it may end up being another Comet.
Its Boeings fault though, their management and lobbyists should be fired / arrested for trying to circumvent safety for short term gain and profit.