Aviation

The problems in the 787 program doesn´t seem to end. The flightblogger reports about further delays in the assembly of Delayliner, sorry ... Dreamliner One:

According to several sources inside the 787 program and others familiar with the schedule, assembly completion of Dreamliner One is now tentatively targeted for early October, a slip of about five weeks.

Assembly completion was initially set for August 31, just four days prior to the expiration of the IAM's three-year contract.

This retargeting was done before the union of the aircraft workers voted for a strike. I really start to think, that there won´t be any deliveries in 2009, really bad new for an aircraft that was initially planned to bring guests to the Olympic games in Beijing ....

You may remember the crash at Heathrow, where an 777 landed short of the runway. The UK’s Air Accidents Investigation Branch published an report to document the actual state of the investigation. At the moment, they think that ice buildup in the fuel system took out both engines. This can happen as fuel contains a certain amount of water. But the ice buildup is a little bit strange, as the aircraft was operated within the certified operational envelope, thus the AAIB already recommended that the aircraft security authorities should look after this issue not only for the 777 with Trent engines, but for future certifications.

They don´t have their own A380 aircrafts but after Air France/KLM there is a second airline interested in a even bigger A380 as Mr. Gallois disclosed in a newspaper interview. The german Lufthansa wants this plane, too. The A380-900 would be able to carry 963 passengers.

Relatively short after the crash there were rumours about deployed thrust reversers at one of the engines of the Spanair aircraft and shortly after this you were able to find a photo (login needed) of this engine at the usual discussion areas. Today two spanish newspaper reported according to Aviationweek and the german newssite sueddeutsche.de (based on dpa) that the thrust reverser of one engine were found in the deployed position.

Albeit this would explain some of the reported reactions of the plane, it´s much to early to draw any conclusions. The question is now: Were the reversers in this position before the crash or were they moved in this position by the crash. We have to wait for the final accident report ...

PS: Nevertheless this evoked memories to the LaudaAir 004 crash in me: Mid-air deployment of the reversers in 24,700 feet. Nobody in the aircraft survived the crash.

Wer sich dafür interessiert, was so im Dunstkreis der Bundesstelle für Flugunfalluntersuchung so an Unfällen und Störungen passiert ist, kann sich mal den Jahresbericht 2007 durchlesen. Ist aber vielleicht keine Lektüre für Leute mit Flugangst.

Journalists, especially those working for TV news programs are a little bit weird. Every few days they repeat Discovery Channel documentations about aircraft crash analysis (UA811, TWA800, El-Al Flight 1862, Swiss-Air 111) here in Germany - for example N24 - about the difficult and problematic post crash analysis. Sometime it takes years to find the real reason of an aircraft crash. Nevertheless journalists bash Spanair for giving no further informations about the causes for the crash. They should know better, at least when they look they own news programm. Nobody can tell more than speculative assumptions after just 2 days.

The bad thing: In an interview, a woman blamed Spanair for giving her less informations than the news. The problem: The news in the news are just rumours.

And then the Air Accident report will give an exact answer to the crash cause in a few months, no TV programm will report about it. Well, they will report about it, if Discovery Channel makes a documentation about it ... telling how hard it was to find the reason ... again ...

The last three delays for the 787 were related to supply chain problems, now Boeing told the press that there are certification problems with the brake monitoring software as RedOrbit reports in: Boeing 787 Dreamliner Experiences Another Delay:

Shanahan, who has led the 787 program since October last year, said the latest hitch has been delays in getting the software in the 787's brake control system verified to meet stringent certification requirements. [...|"It's not that the brakes don't work, it's the traceability of the software," Shanahan said[...]He said that Crane had to go back and rewrite certain parts of the brake control software to verify it for the certification process.

My sources in the airline industry told me that the certification is the hardest part at building a plane and thus problem can haunt you for a while when you are not really cautious. In addition to that the damages part of the Dreamliner Four introduce further timing problems, as they have to rebuild that section completly.

Well, i hope that Boeing is able to get rid of the problem. Another delay doesn´t really sound as beneficial for the company. They already sold near of a thousand airplanes and only a million dollars of additional contract fines per plane would cost them $1bn now.

Ist ja echt schade, das mein Nachname etwas seltener ist ... sonst wuerde mir die Air Berlin vielleicht auch die Bordkarten für interessante Ziele anderer Leute anbieten .... Immer nur nach München mit AB zu fliegen ist auf die Dauer doch langweilig

Well, Northop lost the deal after the GAO ruling, there will be an new Request for Proposals ... but i really think that Boeing won´t get the deal in the next attempt either when there is no further political counterfire.

The problem is somewhat bigger: Let´s assume Boeing has enough time to build a tanker on the foundation of the 777 airframe to get a bigger aircraft. They have another problem: They do not have the capacities to build it. The 777 is a successful plane and in addition to that they sell this planes as an interims solution for airlines with an urgent need for aircrafts since the 787 is vastly delayed at the moment. The USAF would be a customer like anyone else and do not believe Boeing can explain to their commercial customers that the next 150 airframes are reserved for the USAF ... which in turn would be nice for Airbus: More A330/A340 to sell. And they can´t put the tanker 777 at the end of the line. At several locations in the net you can read that they need a replacement for their old tankers really soon.

The solution with the 767 wouldn´t have this problem. It´s an EOLed planed for commercial customers and thus they have the capacities to produce it in the old assembly lines. So the point "the airforce wants a bigger tanker" is a real problem to Boeing. They are dependent to the old requirements in the request for an proposal. And in some news outlets in the US you can already see the lobbying against a modification of the requirements in favour of an bigger plane.

I think, the end of this year will really interesting for both companies.

On May 25th a 747 of Kalitta Air breaked in parts after a rejected take off after shooting over the end of the runway. It looks like Kalitta Air has a strain of bad luck at the moment: CNN reported that another 747 crashed into a house near Bogota: 747 freighter crashes in Colombia. The second crash of a Kalitta aircraft in 6 weeks. According to other news services it was the N714CK, a converted 747-200. This aircraft was delivered in 1981, thus it was 29 years old.

I don´t think, that i will fly with the 787 anytime soon ... even in case, this baby will fly next year. There are new delays in the programs. As far as the usual suspects report, a mechanic at Alenia was able to destroy a complete barrel of the fuselage by using wrong fasteners. The damage was so severe, that they wait for a new center fuselage barrel.

Okay, this can happen, but this rises some questions for me as an outsider to this business : How do Boeing expect that an ordinary flight mechanic can repair the 787 on the apron, when a catering truck bumps into the plane or an uncautious loader rams its vehicle into lower deck? When even the people at the factory are unable to repair a damage? And to think it the other way round: Will they throw away such fuselage parts in the future or will they repair this to save some money (Boeing is a public traded company and i think Fight Club was right with it´s presentation of the internal logic of companies). The damage must have been severe enough that Boeing examines it complete schedule as Dreamliner Four plays an important role in the flight test schedule. And this just by the mistake of a single mechanic.

Additionally: This damage happpened at a part of the plane that was problematic for Boeing in the past as reported for example at Design News: Boeing Stiffens 787 Wing Box Spars: More Schedule Delays Possible.

Some strange: AirportBusiness.com reports in "787 partner halts work briefly after FAA audit":

The South Carolina plant that assembles the mid-fuselage of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner halted production for 24 hours beginning Monday night after a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) audit found lax manufacturing procedures that could result in damage to the aircraft sections.
[...]
He said it wasn't surprising the FAA found issues, given the high number of workers there who "never worked on airplanes before.
[...]
"In the beginning ... they were basically looking the other way to get the plane built," said the contractor. "Now people are paying attention to procedures and everything is being done by the letter of the law."

Sorry that i can´t resist ... but: The test flight pilots should wear parachutes not only on first flight

Well, i´m not in the aircraft business and i´m just a interested outsider , but at the moment my confidence as an upcoming consumer in this aircraft is waning at best ...

Okay, most times a good compromise is a good thing, but Thomas Cook goes a tad too far ...


(via: Flight International)

I´ve collected some comments from the aviation world in the last few days:

• Power-on-Testing on 787
• 787 delays
• The US Air Force tanker deal

I know some of the people, which were temporaely relocated to Airbus in Toulouse, and i know they work really hard for their money. So i have no grasp for the insults made by Mr. Gallois. In a interview with AFP Mr. Galois wants to send the german back to Hamburg as soon as possible.He stated that german employees work less than their colleagues and they stay to long in front of the coffee machine.WTF? Employee motivation looks different. But i assume, that wasn´t the objective of such comments.