Thursday, April 3, 2014

787 performance needs to improve according to Japan Airlines chairman

Japan Airlines (JAL) chairman Masaru Onishi said its Boeing 787-8 fleet needs to further improve reliability.
                                                                       
Speaking on the sidelines of the oneworld alliance event in São Paulo, Onishi said, “We still have some initial technical issues. Like Boeing and other airlines, JAL would like to increase our 787-8 performance.” He said all JAL’s aircraft have a 95% reliability rate.

JAL operates 15 Boeing 787s.

In January, JAL reported a “main battery failure” on one of its Boeing 787-8s parked at Tokyo Narita Airport. The airline reported that “white smoke” was seen in the incident, which resulted in no injuries.

The latest JAL 787 battery incident occurred more than seven months after JAL resumed 787 flying following a global grounding of the Dreamliner fleet prompted in large part by a battery fire aboard a parked JAL 787 at Boston Logan Airport on Jan. 7, 2013.

Boeing last year designed a comprehensive fix for the 787’s two high-powered lithium ion batteries, used for the aircraft’s main battery and auxiliary power unit (APU), which was approved by FAA and enabled the resumption of 787 commercial flights following a grounding that lasted more than three months.

“If I compare the 787 with other aircraft types, like the Boeing 777, the 787 (performance) is still low, and we must improve that in the future,” he said.

(Kurt Hofmann - ATW Online News)

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