JAL: robust demand helps offset Boeing 787 grounding impact

Feb 4 (Reuters) - Japan Airlines Co Ltd raised its annual operating profit forecast by nearly 13 percent on robust demand on European, North American and Southeast Asian routes, helping offset any impact from the grounding of Boeing 787 jets.

Japan Airlines said it lifted its operating profit forecast to 186 billion yen ($2 billion) from a previous estimate of 165 billion yen.

JAL says 787 should stay at centre of fleet strategy

(Reuters) - Japan Airlines Co Ltd President Yoshihiro Ueki said on Monday that Boeing's 787 Dreamliner, which has been grounded worldwide after two battery incidents, should stay at the centre of its fleet strategy.

"It's a shame about the battery, but it is a wonderful aircraft," Ueki said.

(Reporting by Tim Kelly; Editing by Michael Urquhart)

JAL wants to discuss 787 grounding compensation with Boeing

(Reuters) - Japan Airlines Co Ltd said it will talk to Boeing Co about compensation for the grounding of the 787 Dreamliner, adding that the idling of its jets would cost it nearly $8 million from its earnings through to the end of March.
The carrier, which operates seven of the 50 Dreamliners in service around the world, said robust demand on European, North American and Southeast Asian routes would help offset the impact of the 787's grounding, and it increased its annual operating profit forecast by almost 13 percent.
"Rather than negotiations with Boeing, the important thing now is getting the 787 flying again safely as soon as we can," said JAL's president Yoshiharu Ueki. "However, when the situation has settled down we can and are preparing to begin those talks."
Rival All Nippon Airways, which has more 787s than JAL, said last week it would seek compensation from Boeing once the amount of damages was clearer.
JAL raised its operating profit forecast to 186 billion yen ($2 billion) for the year to end-March, from a previous estimate of 165 billion yen. It predicted the impact on its earnings from the grounding of the technologically advanced Dreamliner at around 700 million yen for the rest of this fiscal year.
All Boeing's 787s are out of action as investigators in Japan and the United States try to find the cause of two recent incidents with the plane's lithium-ion batteries - a battery fire on a JAL 787 at a U.S. airport and an emergency landing by another plane on a domestic ANA flight after battery problems triggered a smoke alarm.
U.S. officials said late last week they were making progress in their investigation into the battery fire at Boston airport.
($1 = 92.6100 Japanese yen)
(Reporting by Tim Kelly; Editing by Ian Geoghegan)

Boeing 787 investigation making progress

(Reuters) - U.S. officials on Friday said they are making progress in their investigation of a battery fire on a Boeing Co 787 Dreamliner in Boston this month, as the grounding of Boeing's entire fleet of 787s stretched into a third week.
All 50 Boeing 787s remain grounded as authorities in the United States, Japan and France investigate the Boston battery fire on January 7 and a separate battery failure that forced a second 787 to make an emergency landing in Japan a week later.
The U.S. safety board said it continued to look at flight data recorded aboard the 787 aircraft involved in the January 7 event at Boston airport for any information about the performance of the lithium-ion battery that caught fire, and its charging system, which was built by Securaplane, a unit of Britain's Meggitt Plc (MGGT.L).
"Our investigators are moving swiftly and we are making progress," Kelly Nantel, a spokeswoman for the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board, said after the U.S. safety board issued a seventh update on the investigation. She did not elaborate.
Boeing welcomed the news and said it continued to work closely with authorities in the United States and Japan.
The NTSB said an expert from the Department of Energy had joined the investigation, and an NTSB investigator would travel to France on Sunday or Monday with a "battery contactor", which connects the battery to the planes' electrical systems, for further tests at the equipment's manufacturer, Thales SA (TCFP.PA).
The NTSB experts at the U.S. Naval Surface Warfare Center laboratories were continuing to look at a second, undamaged lithium-ion battery pulled from the same Japan Airlines (9201.T) plane. Both batteries were built by GS Yuasa (6674.T), a Japanese company.
Initial tests, including infrared thermal imaging of each cell in the undamaged battery, found no anomalies, according to the NTSB update. It said the battery's eight cells were undergoing another scan to examine their internal condition.
U.S., Japanese and French safety inspectors - aided by industry officials - have been trying to determine what caused the battery fire on the 787 in Boston and a separate battery failure in Japan that involved smoke the following week.
The failure of investigators to identify the root cause of the incidents has sparked concerns that the 787 grounding will last longer, and hit Boeing and the airlines that operate the 787 harder than expected.
But Boeing's chief executive, Jim McNerney, told investors this week that the company planned to speed up production of the jet as planned, and had not seen any reason to question its use of lithium ion batteries on the 787.
Boeing's shares closed 1.35 percent higher at $74.87 on the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday.
Neither the NTSB, nor the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, which is looking at a broader range of problems with the 787, have set timetables for completing their work.
Investigations are also continuing in Seattle, where Boeing builds the planes, and in Japan. (Reporting By Andrea Shalal-Esa; Editing by Leslie Gevirtz and Carol Bishopric)

US STOCKS-Futures dip after 5-yr highs with data, earnings due

* Factory orders data due
* Japan Airlines to talk to Boeing about compensation
* Futures off: Dow 30 pts, S&P 4.4 pts, Nasdaq 7.75 pts
By Chuck Mikolajczak
NEW YORK, Feb 4 (Reuters) - U.S. stock index futures slipped on Monday after the S&P 500 hit a five-year high and the Dow rose above 14,000 last week as investors waited for factory orders data and another round of corporate earnings.
The benchmark S&P index is up more than 6 percent for the year, with nearly half of the gains coming in the session after U.S. legislators successfully sidestepped the "fiscal cliff" of tax increases and spending cuts which threatened to derail the economic recovery.
The gains have left the index roughly 60 points away from its all-time intraday high of 1,576.09.
"We are coming off an economic data hangover from Friday and the market was on a bullish spree. This is an opportunity for investors to take advantage of the bull run," said Andre Bakhos, director of market analytics at Lek Securities in New York.
The Dow's march above 14,000 was the highest October 2007.
"With an early year run of better than 6 percent, investors are already behind in performance and pullbacks should be shallow and well contained, giving the underweighted investors the opportunity to move into equities."
Investors will look to December factory orders data for signs of economic improvement. Economists in a Reuters survey expect a rise of 2.2 percent compared with an unchanged reading in December.
Economic data has pointed to a modest U.S. recovery, but the data has not been strong enough to upset investor expectations the Federal Reserve will continue its stimulus policy that has buoyed stocks.
Earnings are due from a number of companies including Anadarko Petroleum Corp ; Yum! Brands Inc, owner of fast-food chains, and household products company Clorox .
S&P 500 futures fell 4.4 points and were below fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures lost 30 points, and Nasdaq 100 futures shed 7.75 points.
According to Thomson Reuters data, of the 239 companies in the S&P 500 that have reported earnings through Friday, 68 percent have reported earnings above analyst expectations compared with the 62 percent average since 1994 and the 65 percent average over the past four quarters.
S&P 500 fourth-quarter earnings are expected to rise 3.8 percent, according to the data. That estimate is above the 1.9 percent forecast at the start of earnings season, but well below the 9.9 percent fourth-quarter earnings forecast on Oct. 1.
Japan Airlines Co Ltd said it will talk to Boeing Co about compensation for the grounding of the 787 Dreamliner, adding that the idling of its jets would cost it nearly $8 million from its earnings through to the end of March.
Chevron Corp dipped 0.9 percent to $115.47 in premarket trade after UBS cut its rating on the Dow component to "neutral."
European shares dipped by midday as a near-term risk of a technical sell-off and political uncertainty in the euro zone prompted a bout of profit taking with indexes hovering near multiyear highs.
Asian shares climbed to 18-month highs after U.S. data showed some promise of a credible recovery but not strong enough to threaten the Federal Reserve's easing plans, while momentum also gained on firmer manufacturing data from Europe and China.

UAE's Etihad says to keep Dreamliner order; no Alitalia talks

(Reuters) - Abu Dhabi's Etihad Airways, has no plans to cancel its orders of Boeing's troubled 787 Dreamliner, the airline chief executive James Hogan said.
When asked if Etihad would cancel any Boeing orders, he said: "Not at all."
"787 is a great aircraft, we have no doubt it will be resolved and the aircraft will be up and fine," Hogan said.
All 50 Boeing 787s remain grounded as authorities in the United States, Japan and France investigate the Boston battery fire and a separate battery failure that forced a second 787 to make an emergency landing in Japan a week later.
Etihad has a total of 41 787-9 Dreamliners on order and options for an additional 25 aircraft.
Hogan also said that the airline has had no discussions with Alitalia beyond code sharing.
(Reporting by Stanley Carvalho; Writing by Praveen Menon)

Saft's belief in lithium-ion battery survives 787 woes

(Reuters) - France's Saft (S1A.PA), a leading industrial battery maker, said the grounding of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner had not hurt its confidence in the aircraft's lithium-ion batteries.
The head of the company developing similar batteries for rival Airbus (EAD.PA) insisted the powerful but lightweight power packs are the best and safest way of providing backup power for the new generation of 'wired' passenger aircraft.
"It is difficult to imagine that we could stop this kind of progress," Chief Executive John Searle said in an interview.
He declined to comment on U.S. and Japanese investigations into two separate lithium-ion battery incidents, including a fire, on two Boeing (BA.N) Dreamliners, all of which were grounded by regulators earlier this month.
Searle said he was confident regulators would not change their minds about the benefits of lithium-ion technology or seek to ban it from commercial jets.
Saft, which says it is the world leader in lithium-ion batteries for the space and defense sectors, is developing them for the Airbus A350, which is due to make its maiden flight later this year.
It also provides lithium-ion batteries for the Lockheed Martin (LM.N) F-35, the world's largest military project.
Boeing's 787 is the first passenger jet to rely on lithium-ion main batteries, which weigh up to 40 kg less than traditional nickel cadmium ones.
Boeing said on Wednesday it saw no immediate reason to switch back to the technology used in previous jet models, citing progress in finding the cause of the two battery scares.
But pressure is growing on regulators to guarantee the safety of lithium-ion batteries before the 50 Dreamliners that have already been delivered, each costing $200 million, can return to service.
Shares in Saft are up 13 percent so far this year in the wake of the 787 crisis, after dropping 19 percent in 2012, valuing the company at 500 million euros ($678.5 million).
NICHE STRATEGY
Faced with competition from Asian battery makers in the car market, Saft will stick to niches such as heavy goods vehicles, limited series such as Formula One racing cars and possibly small, low-cost hybrid vehicles, Searle said.
"The very large markets are markets for large Chinese manufacturers. For this reason, we are not that interested in electrical cars in volume," Searle said.
The British-born engineer said lithium-ion technology could represent 35 percent of Saft's sales in 2015, compared with 10-12 percent in 2011, thanks to output hikes in Jacksonville, Florida.
Slower demand in its traditional businesses of nickel and primary lithium batteries for industry, transportation, civil and military electronics forced the company to cut its sales target twice last year.
In October, Saft said it expected 2012 sales to drop around 2 percent at constant exchange rates and its EBITDA margin to be around 16 percent, down from 17.5 percent in 2011. The company reports earnings on February 18.
Pressure on the industry was highlighted when A123 Systems (AONEQ.PK), a U.S. maker of electric car lithium-ion batteries, filed for bankruptcy protection last year. The U.S. government this week approved its takeover by a U.S. unit of Wanxiang Group, China's largest auto parts maker.
"It is clear that for some of our competitors, last year was very difficult, with the bankruptcy filing of A123 but also of smaller companies," Searle said.
"All the projects take some time, and if you don't have other sources of revenue and profit, it is hard to support medium-term losses," he added.
In 2011, Saft and U.S. auto parts supplier Johnson Controls (JCI.N) ended a five-year partnership in lithium-ion batteries for hybrid and electric cars.
(editing by Jane Baird)

Pratt & Whitney to invest $110 mln in Singapore plants

Jan 31 (Reuters) - Jet engine maker Pratt & Whitney, a unit of United Technologies Corp, will invest $110 million to set up two facilities in Singapore and expand existing operations - a boost to the Asian city-state's efforts to grow its manufacturing base.
A new manufacturing facility will be ready by 2014 and begin making commercial engine fan blades in 2015 and high-pressure turbine discs by 2016, the company said in a statement released on Thursday at an event at Singapore's Seletar aerospace hub.
A new component repair facility will start operating at the end of this year, it said.
Pratt & Whitney said its staff levels in Singapore would grow to 2,500 over the next five years from about 2,300 now.
Its business units in the city-state are now involved in the repair of aircraft engine parts, research and development and other services.
Singapore is an expanding hub for aerospace maintenance, repair, overhaul and manufacturing as companies such as Rolls Royce Holdings PLC and Bombardier Inc expand operations, attracted by the Southeast Asian country's specialised infrastructure and low tax rates.
Firms are also drawn by soaring aircraft deliveries in Asia.
Airbus and Boeing Co have both issued brisk demand forecasts for the next 20 years, predicting $4 trillion of aircraft deliveries, mainly on the back of emerging markets led by Asia.
But some manufacturers from other sectors in Singapore are moving to Malaysia's nearby Iskandar economic zone, which is three times the size of the city-state. Land prices are far lower in Iskandar and electricity costs are about half of Singapore's rates.

UPDATE 2-UAE's Etihad closer to deal with India's Jet Airways

* To present due diligence results to board - Etihad CEO
* CEO Hogan says no plans to cancel Boeing Dreamliner orders
* No talks with Alitalia beyond code sharing
* No plans to issue bonds - Etihad CFO
By Stanley Carvalho and Raissa Kasolowsky
ABU DHABI, Feb 4 (Reuters) - Etihad Airways is close to taking a stake in India's Jet Airways the Abu Dhabi airline said on Monday after reporting a tripling in profits for last year.
Such a deal would support the Indian carrier's efforts to woo foreign investors to help cope with fierce competition and high costs in the Indian market.
Etihad, launched in 2003, is on a buying spree to compete with regional rivals Emirates and Qatar Airways. The Gulf carrier has taken stakes in Virgin Australia and Aer Lingus and raised its shareholding in Air Berlin and Air Seychelles.
"We are doing our due diligence (on Jet Airways) in the next week. We will present it to our board and take it from there," Chief Executive James Hogan said at a press conference.
The Jet Airways deal would be the first foreign investment into India's aviation industry since the government relaxed ownership rules in September last year.
This allows foreign airlines to buy up to 49 percent in the country's domestic carriers, many of which are facing stiff competition and high operating costs.
Hogan said he had met with senior Indian aviation officials and ministers last week to understand the new rules of India's foreign direct investment scheme.
"We also wanted to understand the issues that have impacted Indian civil aviation, how they think this will change in the coming years," he said.
The terms of the possible deal have not been disclosed, but a government source said earlier this month Etihad was in talks to pick up a 24-percent stake in Jet for up to $330 million.
Unlisted Etihad reported net profit of $42 million for 2012, compared with $14 million in the previous year.
DREAMLINER
Hogan also said Etihad had no plans to cancel its orders for Boeing's troubled 787 Dreamliner. Etihad has a total of 41 787-9 Dreamliners on order and options for an additional 25 aircraft.
All 50 Boeing 787s are out of action as investigators in the United States, Japan and France look into problems with batteries on the aircraft.
Japan Airlines said on Monday that it would talk to Boeing about compensation for grounding the 787.
"The 787 is a great aircraft, we have no doubt it will be resolved and the aircraft will be up and fine," Hogan said. When asked if Etihad would cancel any Boeing orders, he said: "Not at all."
Hogan also said that the airline has had no discussions with Italian carrier Alitalia beyond code sharing.
Investors in Alitalia are considering selling their shares in the airline, with some pushing for a deal with long-time stakeholder Air France-KLM.
The airline's chief financial officer James Rigney also said Etihad had no plans to issue bonds for financing its aircraft deliveries this year.

ANA in talks with Boeing to speed up 777 jet deliveries-Nikkei

Feb 3 (Reuters) - Japan's All Nippon Airways is in talks with U.S. aircraft maker Boeing Co to speed up the delivery of three 777 jetliners as its fleet of 787 Dreamliner airplanes remains grounded with undiagnosed battery problems, the Nikkei newspaper said on Sunday.
All 50 Boeing 787s worldwide remain grounded as authorities in the United States, Japan and France investigate a battery fire in Boston on Jan. 7 and a separate battery failure that forced a second 787 to make an emergency landing in Japan a week later.
ANA had planned to add the three Boeing 777 jets to its fleet in fiscal year 2013, but it will aim to get them delivered ahead of schedule to soften the negative impact from the Dreamliner grounding, Shinzo Shimizu, ANA's senior vice president told Nikkei. The airline is also considering keeping older Airbus 320 jets in service for longer, he said.
ANA, Asia's top airline by revenue, lost more than $15 million in revenue from having to cancel Dreamliner flights last month. Earlier this week it said it was unclear as to when Boeing's sophisticated new plane would resume commercial flights, making it harder to predict the longer-term financial impact of having the plane idle.
The Japanese airline has said it has no plans to change its growth strategy, but it conceded that a prolonged grounding of the plane would impact that strategy, and will delay issuing its mid-term business plan for several weeks.
ANA has cancelled close to 850 flights until Feb. 18, affecting over 82,000 passengers. The Dreamliner makes up around 7 percent of ANA's fleet, and the airline normally operates around 1,000 flights a day and carries 3.7 million passengers each month.

Airbus says it has a 'Plan B' for A350 jet batteries

Jan 31 (Reuters) - Airbus has studied alternatives to lithium-ion batteries for its next jet, the A350, and has time to adapt to any rule changes prompted by the problems that have grounded Boeing Co's 787 Dreamliner, its top executive said.
Airbus plans to use lithium-ion batteries on the A350, similar to the technology incorporated in Boeing's 787 airliners, and so far has stood by the modern power packs.
"We studied the integration of these batteries on the A350 very carefully," Airbus Chief Executive Fabrice Bregier told a group of French aerospace journalists on Thursday. "I am very relaxed about this."
The first U.S. grounding of a new model of passenger jet in over 30 years has focused attention on the risks that lithium-ion batteries can overheat and ignite a fire that is harder to put out than most flames, because of the solvents involved.
Airbus warned about the risks of lithium-ion batteries at a closed meeting of airlines in March 2011, according to a presentation first reported by Reuters this week.
"We identified this fragility at the start of development and we think we resolved it about a year ago," Bregier said. "Nothing prevents us from going back to a classical plan that we have been studying in parallel."
He did not provide details, but some aerospace industry sources caution that a redesign of the batteries could require months of engineering work and tests to obtain certification.
"We have a robust design. If this design has to evolve, we have the time to do that," Bregier said. "If it has to change in a more drastic way because the authorities reach the conclusion that the technology is not mature, then we have all the time we need to do this on the A350 before first delivery in the second half of 2014."
The head of the company that makes A350 batteries, France's Saft, told Reuters earlier on Thursday he did not believe there would be a radical rethink by aviation regulators on the use of lithium-ion as a result of the 787's problems.
It is the first time Boeing or Airbus has used the technology in designing commercial passenger jets.
POWER BOOST
Lithium-ion batteries are a third lighter than their older nickel-cadmium counterparts and are also capable of supporting other electrical systems that make the plane lighter. They take up less space than the nickel cadmium batteries used on most jets.
Experts say the 787 relies more heavily than the A350 on electrical systems instead of traditional hydraulics to control brakes and other systems, and therefore needs more power back-up.
The head of the National Transportation Safety Board said after a press conference last week that the lack of a fire-fighting system in the 787's battery compartment, which also contains flight electronics, was one area being examined.
Airbus has declined to say whether the A350 would include battery fire extinguishers, but industry sources say burning materials would instead be expelled outside the plane and that the fire hazard is reduced by electronics also provided by Saft.
Saft declined to comment on the A350 battery design.
Boeing's 787 batteries are supplied by French defence electronics company Thales, which sub-contracts the lithium-ion cells to Japanese company GS Yuasa Corp.
A year after intense global publicity surrounding wing cracks on its A380 superjumbos, Airbus is keen to avoid a public split with its commercial rival on safety issues. But after sending a public message of support to Boeing on the 787 this month, Bregier exhibited frustration at growing speculation over the saga's impact on the A350.
"I'm not going to give any lessons to Boeing. At the same time, I don't have to take any either, when I think we have done well and have a plan which allows me to have aircraft flying with batteries that don't catch fire," he said.
"Let's allow the U.S. authorities to come up with their own recommendations and decisions."
Boeing Chief Executive Jim McNerney said on Wednesday the U.S. planemaker was "narrowing down" the potential causes of the two battery incidents that led to the 787 grounding.

Malaysia sees oneworld as best fit

Photo by Karen Walker

The addition of Malaysia Airlines to the oneworld alliance brings membership up to 12 carriers serving 842 destinations to 156 countries. It was the “best fit” for Malaysia, Group CEO Ahmad Jauhari Yahya said Thursday.
Speaking at ceremonies in Kuala Lumpur on the eve of joining oneworld, Yahya said, “Malaysia has been exploring the best fit for an alliance and we found that in oneworld. We complement oneworld very well. We cover an area of network that is not covered by their airlines and they are very likeminded, very much focused on premium service. So we took out time but we made the right decision.”
Earlier, Malaysia rolled out an Airbus A330-300 in oneworld livery.
Qantas CEO Alan Joyce, oneworld CEO Bruce Ashby, Japan Airlines chairman Masaru Onishi, Cathay Pacific CEO John Slosar and Finnair CEO Mika Vehvilainen were among the executives attending the ceremonies. Malaysia officially joins the alliance Feb. 1.
Two more carriers, Qatar and SriLankan Airlines, have been nominated to join. Malaysia is the first oneworld carrier from the country, while SriLankan will be the first Indian sub-continent carrier and Qatar will be the first of the “big three” Gulf carriers to join any of the three global alliances.
Indian carrier Kingfisher Airlines was set to join, but those plans were cancelled after the airline entered severe financial and legal troubles. It has ceased operations and its aircraft are under threat of being impounded.
Ashby said Thursday that oneworld was not actively meeting with any other Indian airlines. “Our members have a quite strong presence in India. We are open to unfolding events” he said.
“It’s not a case of having the right numbers—there are no target numbers for airlines, lounges. It’s about having the right members. One Heathrow hub, one Hong Kong hub, one Kuala Lumpur hub is worth a million of those other places,” he said.


atwonline.com

ECJ: Ryanair must compensate passengers stranded by ash cloud

The European Court of Justice (ECJ) has ruled that Ryanair must compensate passengers stranded due to the 2010 eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano. Ryanair has warned the landmark ruling against the airline “will materially increase the cost of flying across Europe.”
European law states that, if a flight is cancelled, the air carrier is obliged to “provide care” to passengers as well as compensation. Providing care is defined as providing refreshments, meals and—where appropriate—hotel accommodation, airport transfers, and a means of communication with third parties free of charge. This obligation exists even when the cancellation is caused by “extraordinary circumstances,” except the carrier is not required to pay compensation if it can prove the flight cancellation was caused by such circumstances.
The case was brought before the Dublin Metropolitan District Court (Ireland), which referred to the ECJ for a decision on whether the ash cloud disruptions over Europe went beyond the category of “extraordinary circumstances” and if the carrier was therefore exempt from providing care. The ECJ responded it did not recognize different degrees of “extraordinary circumstances” and confirmed that, in any event, these do not release carriers from their obligation to provide care.
In addition, the ECJ stated there was no defined limitation, either temporal or monetary, on the obligation to provide care. It stated: “All the obligations to provide care to passengers are imposed on the air carrier for the whole period during which the passengers concerned must await their re-routing.”
The court acknowledged that the obligation to provide care “entails financial consequences for air carriers,” but stressed that the protection of passengers “may justify even substantial negative economic consequences for certain economic operators.” However, it pointed out that carriers could “pass on the costs incurred as a result of that obligation to airline ticket prices.”
In a statement, Ryanair said it regretted the ECJ ruling, which it said “now makes the airlines the insurer of last resort even when in the majority of cases (such as ATC delays or national strikes in Europe) these delays are entirely beyond an airline’s control.”
The airline warned: “Consumer airfares will increase as airlines will be obliged to recover the cost of these claims from their customers, because the defective European regulation does not allow us to recover such costs from the governments or unions who are responsible for over 95% of flight delays in Europe.”
Ryanair said the decision had “no retrospective impact” for the airline as all other ash-related claims had already been settled.


atwonline.com

Boeing 787 grounding persists; Airbus comfortable with A350 batteries

The worldwide grounding of the Boeing 787, initiated Jan. 16, shows no sign of being lifted.
Meanwhile, Airbus said it could change plans to use lithium ion batteries on the A350 if necessary, though it remains comfortable with using the technology on the aircraft set to enter service in the second half of 2014.
Boeing chairman, president and CEO Jim McNerney, speaking this week during a conference call with analysts and reporters, declined to discuss what actions will have to be taken to get the 787 back in service. “I don’t want to pre-judge what form of entry into service will be acceptable [to US FAA],” he said. “We all want to understand root cause [of the Japan Airlines (JAL) and All Nippon Airways (ANA) 787 lithium ion battery events] and that’s what we’re focused on.”
Speaking to reporters this week in France, Airbus president and CEO Fabrice Brégier said the company has no intention at this time to move away from using lithium ion batteries on the A350, according to Reuters. (There are lithium ion batteries on A380s, but they are used on a limited basis—to power the aircraft’s emergency lighting system. The A350, like the 787, would use the high-powered batteries on a more extensive, regular basis.)
“We studied the integration of these batteries on the A350 very carefully,” Brégier said, according to Reuters. “I am very relaxed about this.” He added that Airbus believes it has “resolved” any safety concerns related to using lithium ion batteries on the A350.
However, according to Reuters, he said, “Nothing prevents us from going back to a classical plan that we have been studying in parallel … If this design has to evolve, we have the time to do that. If it has to change in a more drastic way because the authorities reach the conclusion that the [battery] technology is not mature, then we have all the time we need to do this on the A350 before first delivery in the second half of 2014.”
McNerney said a “comprehensive root cause analysis and related series of technical analyses” are ongoing by Boeing, FAA, the US National Transportation Safety Board and the Japan Transport Safety Board to determine what happened on the JAL and ANA 787s. “I am confident [these analyses] will identify the root cause of these incidents,” he said.
McNerney emphasized the 787 grounding is a “compartmentalized issue” that is not detracting from other Boeing commercial aircraft programs.



atwonline.com

ALC orders 25 A350 XWBs, firms options for 14 A321neos

Computer rendering of an A350-900 in ALC livery. Courtesy, Airbus

Air Lease Corp. (ALC) has ordered 25 Airbus A350 XWBs plus five options. The order comprises 20 A350-900s and five A350-1000s, plus options on a further five -1000s. The aircraft is due for entry in 2014.
ALC also firmed up options for 14 A321neos following a June 2012 agreement for 36 A320neo family aircraft. Engine selections will be announced later. The A320neo will enter service in late 2015, followed by the larger A321neo in 2016.
With this latest confirmation from ALC, the lessor’s cumulative orders for the A320neo family have reached 50, of which up to 34 will be A321neos.

atwonline.com

Aviation technology advances, FAA tries to keep up

After two separate and serious battery problems aboard Boeing 787s, it wasn't U.S. authorities who acted first to ground the plane. It was Japanese airlines.

DALLAS —
After two separate and serious battery problems aboard Boeing 787s, it wasn't U.S. authorities who acted first to ground the plane. It was Japanese airlines.
The unfolding saga of Boeing's highest-profile plane has raised new questions about federal oversight of aircraft makers and airlines.
Some aviation experts question the ability of the Federal Aviation Administration to keep up with changes in the way planes are being made today - both the technological advances and the use of multiple suppliers from around the globe. Others question whether regulators are too cozy with aircraft manufacturers.
Even as they announced a broad review of the 787 earlier this month, top U.S. transportation regulators stood side-by-side with a Boeing executive and declared the plane safe - saying that they would gladly fly in one. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood repeated his endorsement Wednesday.
A few hours later, the FAA issued an emergency order grounding the planes.
Despite their concerns, many safety experts still believe that the current regulatory process works - the 787s were grounded before any accidents occurred.
The Dreamliner is the first airliner whose structure is made mostly from composite materials rather than aluminum. The plane relies more than previous airliners on electrical systems rather than hydraulic or mechanical ones, and it's the first airliner to make extensive use of lithium-ion batteries to power cabin-pressurization and other key functions.
Such technological advances may force the FAA to re-examine the way it does its job.
"We've gone from aviation to aerospace products that are much more complex," said Richard Aboulafia, an aviation analyst with the Teal Group. "The FAA is equipped for aviation. Aerospace is another matter."
Former National Transportation Safety Board member Kitty Higgins said the FAA must consider whether changes in its certification process would have turned up the problems in the Dreamliner battery systems.
"They need to make sure the certification process stays current with the industry and the new technology," she said.
An FAA spokeswoman declined to comment for this article, referring instead to statements made during a news conference last week. Officials said then that the review of the 787 wouldn't be limited to the Dreamliner's batteries. FAA Administrator Michael Huerta said that the agency would "make sure that the approved quality control procedures are in place and that all of the necessary oversight is done."
The FAA has said that its technical experts logged 200,000 hours testing and reviewing the plane's design before certifying the plane in August 2011. Boeing defended the process and the plane.
"We are confident in the regulatory process that has been applied to the 787 since its design inception," said Boeing Co. spokesman Marc Birtel. "With this airplane, the FAA conducted its most robust certification process ever."
A week ago, FAA's Huerta and Transportation Secretary LaHood endorsed the Dreamliner's safety even as they ordered a new review of its design and construction following a fire in a lithium-ion battery on a 787 that had landed in Boston. Then, this past Wednesday, after a battery malfunction on a second plane resulted in an emergency landing, they grounded Dreamliner flights in the U.S.
In certifying new planes, the FAA relies heavily on information from the manufacturers. That system has worked - the U.S. commercial airline fleet is safer than ever - but it is coming under renewed scrutiny after the 787 incidents.
Experts say that FAA officials have no choice but to rely on information from aircraft manufacturers as key systems of the plane are designed and built.
"As a practical matter, they can't do the testing," said longtime aviation consultant Daniel Kasper of Compass Lexecon. "They don't have the expertise in aircraft design, and they don't have the budget - it would be too costly. They would have to be involved in every step."
Thomas Anthony, director of the aviation-safety program at the University of Southern California, said many new planes have flaws that are only discovered once they go into service, and that the regulatory process worked the way it was supposed to with the Dreamliner.
"The FAA used to be accused of `blood priority'" - acting only after a disaster, Anthony said. "In this case, it's not true. The regulators are taking their job seriously. There were no accidents, there were no injuries, there were no fatalities."
That has not always been the case. In 1979, authorities grounded the McDonnell Douglas DC-10 for five weeks after an engine tore loose from the wing of an American Airlines plane, causing a crash that killed 273 in Chicago. And there were other incidents that occurred after the DC-10 was introduced in 1971, including cargo-door problems that forced one emergency landing and caused a Turkish Airlines crash that killed 346 in 1974.
Boeing, based in Chicago, is racing to find a fix to the Dreamliner's battery systems and get the planes back in the air. It is still producing 787s but has stopped delivering them to customers.
Bloomberg News reported that Boeing has tried to persuade FAA to end the groundings by proposing a variety of inspections and having pilots monitor electronic signals from the batteries to prevent fires. The FAA has been reluctant to approve those steps without a clear idea of what caused the defects and how they can be prevented.
The National Transportation Safety Board said in a statement issued Sunday that its own investigation continues into the Jan. 7 fire aboard the Japan Airlines Boeing 787 at Boston's Logan International Airport. An NTSB statement said the lithium-ion battery that powered the auxiliary power unit had been disassembled and examined at an agency laboratory. It added that the battery was X-rayed and CT scans were generated and certain components would undergo further scrutiny.
It also said investigators have examined several other components taken from the plane, including wire bundles and battery management circuit boards, adding test plans were being developed for those and other components removed from the aircraft. According to the statement, several other components were sent for further examination at Boeing's facility in Seattle and the manufacture's facilities in Japan.
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AP Airlines Writer Joshua Freed contributed to this story from Minneapolis.
Follow David Koenig at http://www.twitter.com/airlinewriter

No sign of surge in 787 battery fire, says NTSB

There was no voltage surge when a lithium-ion battery caught fire Jan. 7 aboard a Boeing 787 at Logan International Airport in Boston, U.S. aviation-safety investigators said early Sunday.

U.S. aviation-safety investigators said early Sunday there was no voltage surge when a lithium-ion battery caught fire Jan. 7 aboard a Boeing 787 at Logan International Airport in Boston.
The National Transportation Safety Board said flight recorder data from the Japan Airlines plane showed the battery “did not exceed its designed voltage of 32 volts.”
Investigators in the U.S. and Japan are probing the batteries at the center of two incidents that led to the dramatic grounding of the worldwide fleet of 787s. The Federal Aviation Administration and regulators elsewhere ordered the grounding after a second incident in Japan on Jan. 16 involving the lithium ion batteries that produce electricity for the plane’s auxiliary power units (APUs).
Boeing has said its battery system has controls to prevent excessive charging or discharging, which is one possible cause for the battery incidents.
The NTSB released no other conclusions, but detailed how the eight-cell lithium ion battery and related electrical equipment have been dismantled by investigators for further study, including x-ray and CT scans.
“On Tuesday, the group will convene in Arizona to test and examine the battery charger and download nonvolatile memory from the APU controller,” the NTSB statement said. “Several other components have been sent for download or examination to Boeing’s facility in Seattle and manufacturer’s facilities in Japan.”

At Boeing, pushback on 787 grounding

Boeing’s leadership privately believes the government’s grounding of the company’s flagship 787 Dreamliner was an unnecessarily drastic step, but its defensive attitude isn’t sitting well with some customers and risks alienating regulators.

Boeing’s leadership privately believes the government’s grounding of the company’s flagship 787 Dreamliner was an unnecessarily drastic step, but its defensive attitude isn’t sitting well with some customers and it risks alienating regulators.
“You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone at Boeing who believes the FAA should have grounded it,” said a former top executive, who asked for anonymity in speaking about his former colleagues. “They all believe the airplane is safe.”
But an executive in charge of fleet planning for a major airline that has 787s on order expressed astonishment that Boeing has seemed to minimize what he sees as potentially critical incidents.
“At no stage have they appeared to be open to admitting the seriousness of what’s happened,” the executive said. “They are basically still in denial.”
Before ordering the first such grounding in more than three decades, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) first announced a sweeping 787 safety review when a battery caught fire on an empty Japan Airlines (JAL) 787 parked in Boston, shortly after 137 passengers and crew disembarked from a 12-hour flight.
Then just days after unveiling the review, an All Nippon Airways (ANA) 787 was forced to make an emergency landing in western Japan when a battery overheated and spewed hot chemicals and soot into the electronics bay.
The next day, the FAA followed Japanese airlines in grounding the Dreamliner, and regulators worldwide followed suit
Nonetheless, Boeing chief executive Jim McNerney, in a message to employees Friday, said “We have high confidence in the safety of the 787 and stand squarely behind its integrity.”
“We are working around the clock to support the FAA, our customers, and others in the investigations,” McNerney wrote.
Gordon Bethune, the former Boeing executive who left to run Continental Airlines — and who in that position bought the grounded Dreamliners now owned by United — is emphatic that the government overreached.
He criticized the decision to ground the plane, which was made by Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood and FAA chief Michael Huerta.
“Neither of those two guys know the front end from the back of an airplane,” Bethune said.
“They jumped the gun, but that’s the product of a cover-your-ass administration,” he fumed. “It’s heavy-handed, draconian and way, way beyond what needs to be done to protect the public.”
”Obviously, (Boeing’s leaders) are disappointed in this overreaction,” Bethune said. “But it doesn’t help them to bitch, so they will never say anything publicly that could be disparaging to the government.”
“Don’t think they are making light of this,” Bethune added. “I’m sure they are chagrined as hell. But they are going to fix it.”
While many airline customers have publicly expressed confidence in Boeing, privately some have reservations.
On Friday, the fleet planning executive for a 787 customer airline looked at a photo of the burned-out battery taken from the ANA jet and said he feels “very uneasy” that Boeing minimized the in-flight threat.
Though apparently in that case there was no fire outside the battery, the charred mess visible inside after investigators opened it up was startling enough.
And he noted that when a fire had broken out a week earlier from a battery on a Japan Airlines 787 parked in Boston, Boeing’s public statements never used the word “fire.”
After the Boston fire, Boeing tried to narrow the scope of the FAA’s safety review, according to a person with knowledge of the situation.
And right up until the announcement that the planes were grounded following the in-flight ANA incident, Boeing argued to the FAA that passengers were never at risk.
A person with knowledge of the deliberations said Boeing maintained that safety controls had worked as designed on that flight to shut down the battery and prevent a fire.
Regulators were not persuaded.
Now Boeing is struggling to satisfy aviation authorities in both the U.S. and Japan with an interim fix that includes thorough one-time battery inspections and instructions to pilots to do specific preflight electrical system checks.
However, the release Friday by the Japan Transport Safety Board of the ANA battery photo, along with a public statement by Japan transport-ministry investigator Hideyo Kosugi that suggests the battery may have been overcharged, undermine the proposal for an interim fix.
Boeing Vice President Mike Sinnett, briefing reporters about the battery’s safety features last week, said the battery couldn’t overcharge because four independent control systems would shut off the power to the battery before anything that critical occurred.
Perhaps that system worked as intended. But investigators are still working on finding out and the burned-out state of the battery raises concern.
“Until they know what caused it, they can’t start finding a fix,” said the airline executive.
An interim solution of battery inspections “is a tough sell to the FAA and to the operators without knowing the root cause,” he added.
Business impact
The impact of the grounding on Boeing’s business will depend on how long it takes to work out a fix and get the planes flying again.
If the planes are allowed back in the air within the next week or so, the long-term impact will be minimal, industry experts agree.
In that case, the cost to Boeing in financial terms will not be material, said two Wall Street analysts.
Doug Harned of Bernstein Research said it cost Airbus $350 million to fix the wing rib cracks discovered last year on its A380 superjumbo planes. Such a structural flaw is much harder to fix than a component like a battery that can be swapped out.
And even when an engine on a Qantas A380 exploded in flight, the total cost to engine maker Rolls-Royce to fix the problem and compensate Qantas was about $255 million.
“It’s hard to think of this as worse,” Harned said of the 787 battery problem. “The cost of fixing this will be much, much less.”
Rob Spingarn, of Credit Suisse, said a significant impact on Boeing will come only if the grounding is extended enough to affect production.
He projects 71 Dreamliner deliveries in 2013, bringing in about $7 billion in cash.
That’s real money. At this stage, Boeing is adamant that production will continue on schedule.
Contractually, Boeing will have to pay only for fixing the jets, and for retrofitting the fleet already built with any required changes.
That’s “peanuts,” said the airline executive, compared to what it’s costing the airlines to cancel their 787 flights and take care ofthe passengers booked on them.
But he said Boeing “takes a tough stance” on post-delivery compensation and likely won’t pay out much to the affected airlines.
The former Boeing executive agreed, saying that contracts with airline customers typically fence off all future liabilities — “no strings attached at the time of delivery.”
“Boeing draws a clear line,” he said.
Effect on airlines
United, the only U.S. customer with grounded 787s, won’t be harmed too much because it has a big fleet and can substitute 777s, said the former Boeing exec.
In addition, the grounding comes during the offseason for travel, so airlines generally have excess capacity.
Perhaps the most affected customer will be the Polish airline LOT, which on Wednesday flew its first 787 from Warsaw to Chicago and now can’t fly it back.
LOT is depending on revenue from 787 international flights to climb out of serious financial trouble.
“LOT is hanging by their teeth,” said the former Boeing executive. “It’s a huge blow. Whether they exist in a year depends on the 787.”
Bethune said he expects Boeing to negotiate some kind of compensation with individual airlines.
But he believes production will continue.
”It would be very premature to stop building airplanes,” said Bethune. “People are waiting for these airplanes.”
Adam Pilarski, industry analyst with consulting firm Avitas, said airlines have few alternatives to the 787 available anytime soon. That makes it unlikely that many orders will be canceled.
Airbus’s rival A350 won’t be available before 2016 at the earliest, and the A330 is sold out beyond 2014.
“The airlines that are to take the 787 in the next year or two are counting on this airplane,” said the former Boeing executive. “They have to stick it out.”
Indeed, the airline executive so critical of Boeing’s handling of the crisis, despite those misgivings, still needs the airplanes to increase his fleet’s efficiency.
“We definitely want them,” he said of the Dreamliners he has on order. “We remain very committed.”
He said everyone in the business hopes Boeing can find a way out of its mess quickly.
George Greene, a retired FAA chief scientific and technical adviser, said safety trumps everything at both the federal agency and at Boeing.
“Boeing has nothing to gain by not fixing this. If there’s a crash, everybody loses,” Greene said. “I’m positive they are pulling out all the stops to figure it out.”
Dominic Gates: 206-464-2963 or dgates@seattletimes.com

Larsen, Cantwell don’t question FAA grounding of Boeing 787

U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen, the new top Democrat on the House aviation subcommittee, said he won’t second-guess the FAA’s decision to ground Boeing’s 787 fleet over unresolved battery problems.

WASHINGTON — U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen, who Tuesday took over as the top Democrat on the House aviation subcommittee, said he will not second-guess the Federal Aviation Administration’s decision last week to ground Boeing’s 787 fleet over unresolved problems with overheated batteries, saying safety should take precedence over everything else.
“If the FAA believes the grounding is necessary, then I believe it,” said Larsen, of Lake Stevens. “Safety has to come first. I think the people at Boeing recognize that as well.”
Larsen on Tuesday was voted in as the new ranking Democrat on the aviation subcommittee for the 113th Congress. The panel oversees the FAA, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and other agencies as part of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
Boeing’s widebody plant in Everett is in Larsen’s 2nd District and is the district’s largest employer.
The FAA’s rare emergency directive — the first time it has grounded a U.S. jetliner since 1979 — has exacerbated concerns about the Dreamliner’s cutting-edge technology.
Boeing, its suppliers, the NTSB and airlines are scrambling to find the cause of malfunctions aboard two 787s operated by Japanese carriers earlier this month that left one battery burned and another spraying overheated electrolytes.
Asked if the FAA’s certification process for new passenger jets has kept pace with advances in aircraft design and manufacturing, Larsen said the Dreamliner’s woes have not made that an issue yet in Congress.
“Let the FAA and Boeing and the NTSB work through this process” first, said Larsen, adding the House has no plans to schedule hearings over the 787.
In a statement, Sen. Maria Cantwell, who chairs the Senate Subcommittee on Aviation Operations, Safety and Security, said she hopes for a quick resolution that gets the 787s back in the air.
“I support the ongoing NTSB investigation of the two incidents involving lithium batteries and the FAA review of the certification of the critical systems of the Boeing 787,” Cantwell said.
The Senate’s Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee will make the 787 “a priority” in an upcoming aviation-safety hearing that was already in the works, a spokesman for the committee told the Chicago Sun-Times. The committee is chaired by Sen. John Rockefeller, D-W.Va.
The FAA certified the 787 in 2011. But Boeing’s flagship jetliner was involved in at least two fires during its test phase.
The aircraft’s lithium-ion battery caught fire during a test in 2006, which a Boeing spokesman blamed on a flawed test, not battery design, in an interview with The New York Times last week.
And in 2010, a midair fire broke out in one of the plane’s electrical-distribution panels, prompting Boeing to halt all flight tests for about six weeks while it redesigned the panels.
In the first of the two recent incidents, a battery in a Japan Airlines 787 caught fire Jan. 7 after passengers had disembarked at Boston’s Logan Airport. The FAA ordered a comprehensive safety review of the aircraft.
But on Jan. 15, an All Nippon Airways 787 made an emergency landing in Japan after the pilots reported smelling an unfamiliar odor in the cockpit and the passenger cabin that was traced to the battery. Immediately after the second incident, the two Japanese carriers voluntarily took their 787s out of service.
Hours later, the FAA followed with its own order banning American carriers from flying the Dreamliner until the battery problem is fixed.
The FAA has not explained why the All Nippon Airways incident triggered the grounding, except for a statement that the malfunctions “could result in damage to critical systems and structures, and the potential for fire in the electrical compartment.”
Laura Brown, an FAA spokeswoman, declined further comment.
The last time the agency took such action involving a large commercial jet was after the 1979 crash of an American Airlines DC-10, whose left engine fell off shortly after takeoff from Chicago O’Hare Airport. The accident killed 273 people.
Kyung Song: 202-383-6108 or ksong@seattletimes.com

787 grounding spurs ANA to cut back Seattle-Tokyo service

The grounding of Boeing 787s prompts ANA to temporarily reduci its Seattle-Tokyo route to an every-other-day schedule.

All Nippon Airways (ANA) of Japan has temporarily cut by half its flights between Seattle and Tokyo, canceling two-way flights Thursday, Saturday and next Monday due to the grounding of its fleet of 17 Boeing 787 Dreamliners.
The largest current user of 787s said in a schedule update Monday it has reduced its daily Seattle flights to every other day, and is using 777s for those flights.
Approximately 150 to 200 passengers are affected by each cancellation, according to data provided by the airline.
Whether there will be additional cancellations beyond that depends upon how long the grounding of the 787s continues, ANA said.
The airline also canceled through Monday its new daily route between Tokyo and San Jose, Calif., except for a flight Thursday.
Since the grounding last week, ANA has canceled a total 51 international flights and 320 domestic flights.
Last Wednesday, an ANA 787 domestic flight made an emergency landing in Japan after a battery overheated and sprayed hot chemicals into the electronics bay.
The airline grounded its 17 Dreamliners shortly afterward.
Regulators in the U.S. and Japan are investigating the cause of that incident and a 787 battery fire a week earlier in Boston.

NTSB’s methodical probe means longer grounding for Boeing 787

Air-safety experts said the Federal Aviation Administration isn’t likely to lift its order grounding the 787 quickly, given the NTSB’s lack of progress toward finding the root cause of the battery problems.

It looks like Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner fleet, grounded worldwide for the past week, won’t be airborne soon.
The recent fire in a lithium-ion battery aboard a parked Japan Airlines (JAL) 787 in Boston “is a very serious air-safety event,” National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chairwoman Deborah Hersman said Thursday in a briefing on the agency’s investigation.
“We do not expect to see fire events on board aircraft,” she told reporters at the agency’s Washington, D.C., offices.
But the inquiry is far from determining the cause of the fire. “We have not yet ruled anything out,” Hersman said. “There’s a lot more work to be done.”
Air-safety experts said the Federal Aviation Administration isn’t likely to quickly lift its order grounding the 787, given the NTSB’s lack of progress toward finding the root cause and Hersman’s blunt warning.
Former NTSB member John Goglia said Boeing is in limbo until the board can pinpoint the cause of both the Jan. 7 Japan Airlines fire and the overheated battery that forced an emergency landing of an All Nippon Airways (ANA) 787 in Japan a week later.
“They’ve got to find the smoking gun,” said Goglia. “If there’s no definitive cause, this airplane is going to be down for a while.”
“Months, not weeks”
Jim Hall, a former head of the NTSB, concurred: “I think you are looking at months, not weeks.”
Hersman said that although Boeing built multiple and redundant safety features into the battery system, “those systems did not work as intended. ... We need to understand why.”
The NTSB has concluded that the battery short-circuited and suffered a “ thermal runaway,” an uncontrolled overheating that spreads from cell to cell, she said.
But investigators have not established the sequence of those events, or even whether the short-circuit and the thermal runaway were causes or symptoms of what went wrong.
Neither has the NTSB determined for sure whether the battery overcharged or if there could be internal manufacturing defects.
The JAL fire broke out a half-hour after the plane had ended a 12-hour flight from Tokyo to Boston.
All 183 passengers and 11 crew members had left the plane when a mechanic doing routine maintenance checks detected smoke in the cabin, then saw flames from the battery.
The jet was almost new, delivered to JAL only in December.
Hersman said the plane was not plugged into a ground charger before the fire broke out.
She said that when NTSB investigators got to the plane, the battery had already been ripped out by firefighters.
Her team noted structural and component damage in the electronics bay within about a 20-inch radius of the battery.
The battery is used to start the auxiliary power unit, or APU, a small turbine in the tail of the jet.
“The APU battery was spewing molten electrolytes, very hot material,” Hersman said.
The methodical, high-profile investigation is unfolding inside the modest forensic laboratory at NTSB’s headquarters in southwest Washington, D.C.
In a fluorescent-lit room on the fifth floor holding a half-dozen investigators, reporters Thursday paraded by the burned battery from the Dreamliner.
The battery’s cobalt-blue casing sat splayed atop a wheeled cart. One of the battery’s eight cells was left inside for display. Investigators are focusing most on cells five, six and seven, the most damaged.
On an adjacent long table, two strips of 33-foot-long foil windings made of copper and aluminum — the innards of the battery cells — lay unspooled for examination. One of the windings was more heavily damaged, much of it charred and blackened.
The NTSB is working its investigators in two daily shifts in Washington, with more staff deployed to Japan, where the battery is made, and to Tucson, Ariz., where the battery charger is made.
In a statement Thursday afternoon, Boeing said it’s working closely with the regulators to analyze what happened.
“We are working this issue tirelessly,” it said.
Maintenance data
Two electronic devices that recorded maintenance data on the JAL plane are being downloaded at Boeing in Seattle to obtain information recorded after the airplane’s electrical power was interrupted.
In addition to the detailed forensic examination of the plane’s electrical system, Hersman said the NTSB is reviewing manufacturing records and gathering information collected in supplier audits at battery maker GS Yuasa in Japan and the maker of the charging system, Securaplane Technologies. in Tucson.
It is also examining whether the FAA’s certification standards were adhered to and if those standards were adequate, Hersman said.
Four days after the Boston fire, the FAA ordered a sweeping review of the 787’s safety, focused on the electrical systems and including a review of both the design and manufacturing processes.
At that stage, however, the Dreamliners were still flying.
But last week, when the pilot of the ANA plane received instrument warnings of an overheated battery and smelled a burning odor in the cockpit — prompting the emergency landing — the Japanese airlines grounded their airplanes and the FAA followed suit.
In that incident, all 137 people on board evacuated down the emergency slides.
This time, the battery involved was in the forward electronics bay, behind and below the cockpit.
This main battery is “the final power source, should all other electrical generation fail,” Hersman said.
No fire was found, but again hot chemicals had sprayed out of the battery, leaving a trail of dark residue across the compartment.
Although the aircraft was an older jet, delivered to ANA a year earlier, the battery had been installed as a replacement in late October.
How long might the NTSB investigation take to come to a conclusion on the cause of the Boston fire?
“It’s really very hard to tell at this point,” Hersman said. “We have all hands on deck.”
That leaves Boeing in a very tough spot.
The company said it has “teams consisting of hundreds of engineering and technical experts who are working around the clock” to solve the problem.
Former NTSB member Goglia said he wouldn’t be surprised if Boeing already has a team working on a plan to replace the lithium-ion battery with a more conventional one, something that would require an FAA recertification of that part of the electrical system.
“That could take a couple of months,” said Goglia.
Dominic Gates: (206) 464-2963 or dgates@seattletimes.com

Top regulators defend grounding Boeing’s 787

The top two federal regulators who grounded Boeing’s 787s over battery problems vigorously defended their decision Wednesday amid uncertainty about when the jetliners will be cleared to fly again.

WASHINGTON — The top two federal regulators who grounded Boeing’s 787s over battery problems vigorously defended their decision Wednesday amid continuing uncertainty about when the jetliners will be cleared to fly again.
Facing a scrum of reporters for the first time since issuing a rare order Jan. 16 to pull the Dreamliner from service, Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood and Michael Huerta, the administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), said the 787 won’t return to the air until investigators find the root causes of the malfunction.
“We must be confident that the problems are corrected before we can move forward,” LaHood said during a previously scheduled lunch at the Aero Club in Washington, D.C.
LaHood and Huerta issued the emergency directive after separate incidents this month in which one high-energy lithium-ion battery caught fire in a plane on the ground and another sprayed overheated electrolytes, forcing an emergency landing.
After the second incident, Japan Airlines and All Nippon Airways, the two carriers involved, voluntarily grounded their new 787 fleets. The FAA followed suit hours later.
Sounding combative at times, LaHood, a former Illinois congressman, fended off questions about his and Huerta’s lack of technical expertise, criticisms that the FAA should have grounded the planes sooner after the first incident, and conversely whether doing so after the second was overkill.
LaHood said the grounding was necessary to ensure the plane was safe, and that a thorough review by technical investigators will determine the 787’s airworthiness.
“We need to let them finish their work,” LaHood said. “They’ll get to the bottom of it.”
Asked if there was pressure to lift the flight ban, LaHood said, “Absolutely not. Boeing is cooperating 100 percent with this review.”
Huerta added, “We don’t know what caused these incidents yet.” He said any corrective steps, and the fate of the lithium-ion battery — will be dictated by evidence.
“We’ll go where the data takes us,” he said.
The battery on a Dreamliner operated by Japan Airlines burned Jan. 7 after the jet had unloaded passengers at Logan Airport in Boston.
Then Jan. 16, All Nippon Airways (ANA) pilots made an emergency landing in Japan after detecting what they believed were smoke odors. The smell was traced to an overheated battery that spewed electrolytes, which the FAA said could have caused fires in the electrical compartment and damaged critical components.
Huerta said the ANA battery’s failure triggered the grounding “because the second incident occurred in flight.”
Asked if the FAA would have taken that action even if the Japanese carriers hadn’t done so first, Huerta replied, “I’m not going to speculate on that.”
The grounding is the FAA’s first such action against a jetliner since 1979, after a DC-10 crash in Chicago. Since then, engine explosions, collapsed landing gears and other serious accidents have not triggered a fleetwide flight ban until the Dreamliner.
Mary Schiavo, former inspector general for the Transportation Department and an aviation-safety expert, said the FAA had little choice but to act after the battery overheated aboard the ANA jet.
“The second incident in a short period of time set a trend” and suggested the earlier fire in Boston wasn’t an anomaly, said Schiavo, now an aviation attorney in Charleston, S.C. “I do think (the FAA) did the right thing.”
Schiavo said the caution was further warranted because of two known fires during the 787’s test phase before it was certified to fly in 2011. The lithium-ion battery caught fire during a 2006 test conducted with the FAA, and a midair fire flared in one of the jetliner’s electrical-distribution panels in 2010.
Kyung M. Song: 202-383-6108 or ksong@seattletimes.com

NTSB issues seventh update on JAL Boeing 787 battery fire investigation

WASHINGTON - The National Transportation Safety Board today released the seventh update on its investigation into the Jan. 7 fire aboard a Japan Airlines Boeing 787 at Logan International Airport in Boston.
The auxiliary power unit battery, manufactured by GS Yuasa, was the original battery delivered with the airplane on December 20, 2012. It is comprised of eight individual cells. All eight cells came from the same manufacturing lot in July 2012. The battery was assembled in September 2012 and installed on the aircraft on October 15, 2012. It was first charged on October 19, 2012.
Examination and testing of an exemplar battery got underway earlier this week at the Carderock Division of the Naval Surface Warfare Center laboratories in West Bethesda, MD. The tests consisted of electrical measurements, mass measurements, and infrared thermal imaging of each cell, with no anomalies noted. The cells are currently undergoing CT scanning to examine their internal condition. In addition, on Thursday, a battery expert from the Department of Energy joined the investigative team to lend his expertise to the ongoing testing and validation work.

In Seattle, NTSB investigators and Boeing engineers examine the type of lithium ion battery used on the Boeing 787 to start the auxillary power unit and to provide backup power for flight critical systems.

NTSB investigators were made aware of reports of prior battery replacements on aircraft in the 787 fleet, early in the investigation. As reported Tuesday, Boeing, a party to the investigation, is providing pertinent fleet information which investigators will review to determine if there is any relevance to the JAL investigation.
An investigative group continued to interpret data from the two digital flight data recorders on the aircraft, and is examining recorded signals to determine if they might yield additional information about the performance of the battery and the operation of the charging system.
Next week, the NTSB battery testing team will initiate a non-invasive "soft short" test of all cells of the exemplar battery. This test will reveal the presence of any high resistance, small or "soft" shorts within a cell. Also, an NTSB investigator will travel to France with the battery contactor from the JAL event battery, for examination at the manufacturer. The battery contactor connects a wiring bundle from the airplane to the battery.
Investigators are continuing their work in Washington and Japan and the team in Seattle continues to observe the FAA-led review of the certification process for the 787 battery system. The flow of information from these observations helps to inform NTSB investigative activity in the US and around the world.
Additional information on the NTSB's investigation of the Japan Airlines B-787 battery fire in Boston is available at http://go.usa.gov/4K4J.
The NTSB will provide another factual update as developments warrant. To be alerted to any updates or developments, follow the NTSB on Twitter at www.twitter.com/ntsb.

NTSB Chairman says 'We have not ruled anything out' in investigation of Boeing 787 battery fire in Boston.

WASHINGTON - In a press conference today, National Transportation Safety Board Chairman Deborah A.P. Hersman released preliminary findings from the NTSB's ongoing investigation into the Jan. 7, 2013, Boeing 787 battery fire in Boston. "We have not ruled anything out as a potential factor in the battery fire; there are still many questions to be answered," Hersman said.
Noting that there was a B-787 battery incident in Japan on Jan. 16, 2013, which is being investigated by the Japan Transport Safety Board, Hersman said, "One of these events alone is serious; two of them in close proximity, especially in an airplane model with only about 100,000 flight hours, underscores the importance of getting to the root cause of these incidents."
The investigation revealed that the battery in the B-787 fire in Boston showed signs of short circuiting, and had indications of thermal runaway, a situation in which a significant temperature increase can initiate a destructive chain reaction.
Chairman Hersman also expressed concerns about the adequacy of the systems to prevent such a fire from occurring. "The investigation will include an evaluation of how a fault that resulted in a battery fire could have defeated the safeguards in place to guard against that," said Hersman. "As we learn more in this investigation, we will make recommendations for needed improvements to prevent a recurrence."
Investigators developed the following timeline of the events on Jan. 7, which was released at today's briefing:
10:06 am EST - Aircraft arrived at gate in Boston from Narita, Japan
10:32 am - Cleaning and maintenance crew noticed smoke in cabin
10:35 am - Mechanic noted flames coming from APU battery in aft electronics bay
10:37 am - Airport Rescue & Fire Fighting notified
10:40 am - Fire and rescue personnel arrive on scene
12:19 pm - Fire and rescue personnel report event was "controlled"
The batteries were manufactured by GS Yuasa for the Thales electrical installation and are unique to the Boeing 787. The same battery model is used for the main airplane battery and for the battery that is used to start the auxiliary power unit, which is the one that caught fire in Boston.
Radiographic examinations of the incident battery and an exemplar battery were conducted at an independent test facility. The digital radiographs, or computed tomography (CT) scans, generated from these examinations allowed NTSB investigators to document the internal condition of the battery prior to disassembling it.
Ongoing lab work includes an examination of the battery elements with a scanning-electron microscope and energy-dispersive spectroscopy to analyze the elemental constituents of the electrodes to identify contaminants or defects.
NTSB INVESTIGATIVE TEAMS
In addition to the activities at the NTSB lab in Washington, members of the investigative team have been conducting work in Arizona, Seattle and Japan. Their activities are detailed below.
ARIZONA
- The acceptance test procedure of the APU battery charging unit was conducted at Securaplane in Tucson, Ariz., on Jan. 21.
- The battery charging unit passed all significant tests and no anomalies were detected.
- Members of the airworthiness group examined the APU start power unit at Securaplane in Tucson. The same team traveled to Phoenix to conduct an examination of the APU controller at UTC Aerospace Systems.
SEATTLE
- NTSB investigators are working with Boeing teams as part of root cause analysis activities related to the design and manufacturing of the electrical battery system.
- The two JAL B-787 general purpose module units, which record airplane maintenance data are being downloaded at Boeing to obtain information that was recorded after the airplane's electrical power was interrupted.
JAPAN
- The NTSB-led team conducted component examination of the JAL B-787 APU battery monitoring unit at Kanto Aircraft Instrument Company, Ltd., in Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan.
- The team cleaned and examined both battery monitoring unit circuit boards, which were housed in the APU battery case. The circuit boards were damaged, which limited the information that could be obtained from tests.
Additional information on the Japan Airlines B-787 battery fire incident in Boston, including materials from the presentation at today's briefing, can be found at http://go.usa.gov/4K4J.


NTSB

NTSB Update on JAL Boeing 787 Battery Fire Investigation

WASHINGTON - The National Transportation Safety Board today released a fifth update on its investigation into the Jan. 7 fire aboard a Japan Airlines Boeing 787 at Logan International Airport in Boston. The fire occurred after the airplane had landed and no passengers or crew were onboard.
The event airplane, JA829J was delivered to JAL on December 20, 2012. At the time of the battery fire, the aircraft had logged 169 flight hours with 22 cycles. The auxiliary power unit battery was manufactured by GS Yuasa in September 2012.
NTSB investigators have continued disassembling the internal components of the APU battery in its Materials Laboratory in Washington, and disassembly of the last of eight cells has begun. Examinations of the cell elements with a scanning-electron microscope and energy-dispersive spectroscopy are ongoing.
A cursory comparative exam has been conducted on the undamaged main battery. No obvious anomalies were found. More detailed examination will be conducted as the main battery undergoes a thorough tear down and test sequence series of non-destructive examinations.
In addition to the activities at the NTSB lab, members of the investigative team continue working in Seattle and Japan and have completed work in Arizona. Their activities are detailed below.
ARIZONA
The airworthiness group completed testing of the APU start power unit at Securaplane in Tucson and the APU controller at UTC Aerospace Systems in Phoenix. Both units operated normally with no significant findings.
SEATTLE
Two additional NTSB investigators were sent to Seattle to take part in FAA's comprehensive review. One of the investigators will focus on testing efforts associated with Boeing's root cause corrective action efforts, which FAA is helping to lead. The other will take part in the FAA's ongoing review of the battery and battery system special conditions compliance documentation.
JAPAN
The NTSB-led team completed component examination of the JAL APU battery monitoring unit at Kanto Aircraft Instrument Company, Ltd., in Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan. The team cleaned and examined both battery monitoring unit circuit boards, which were housed in the APU battery case. The circuit boards were damaged, which limited the information that could be obtained from tests, however the team found no significant discoveries.
Additional information on the NTSB's investigation of the Japan Airlines B-787 battery fire in Boston can be found at http://go.usa.gov/4K4J.
The NTSB will provide another factual update on Tuesday, Jan. 29, or earlier if developments warrant. To be alerted to any updates or developments, follow the NTSB on Twitter at www.twitter.com/ntsb.


NTSB

NTSB issues sixth update on JAL Boeing 787 battery fire investigation.

WASHINGTON - The National Transportation Safety Board today released the sixth update on its investigation into the Jan. 7 fire aboard a Japan Airlines Boeing 787 at Logan International Airport in Boston.
The examination of the damaged battery continues. The work has transitioned from macroscopic to microscopic examinations and into chemical and elemental analysis of the areas of internal short circuiting and thermal damage.

NTSB investigator Joseph Panagiotou examines a battery cell from the JAL B-787 with a stereo microscope.

Examination and testing of the exemplar battery from the JAL airplane has begun at the Carderock Division of the Naval Surface Warfare Center laboratories. Detailed examinations will be looking for signs of in-service damage and manufacturing defects. The test program will include mechanical and electrical tests to determine the performance of the battery, and to uncover signs of any degradation in expected performance.
As a party contributing to the investigation, Boeing is providing pertinent fleet information, which will help investigators understand the operating history of lithium-ion batteries on those airplanes.
An investigative group continued to interpret data from the two digital flight data recorders on the aircraft, and is examining recorded signals to determine if they might yield additional information about the performance of the battery and the operation of the charging system.
In addition to the activities in Washington, investigators are continuing their work in Seattle and Japan.
Additional information on the NTSB's investigation of the Japan Airlines B-787 battery fire in Boston is available at http://go.usa.gov/4K4J.
The NTSB will provide another factual update on Friday, Feb. 1, or earlier if developments warrant. To be alerted to any updates or developments, follow the NTSB on Twitter at www.twitter.com/ntsb.

NTSB

Battery charger cleared in 787 fire at Boston airport, NTSB says

U.S. investigators examining the battery charger from a Japan Airlines Boeing 787 that caught fire on the ground in Boston have found no evidence of flaws that could have caused the incident.

WASHINGTON — U.S. investigators examining the battery charger from a Boeing 787 that caught fire this month in Boston have found no evidence of flaws that could have caused the incident.
The National Transportation Safety Board has completed testing of the charger at the Tucson, Ariz., plant where it was made by Securaplane Technologies, the agency said in an emailed news release Sunday.
The NTSB also said it found nothing wrong on the device it examined known as an auxiliary power unit, which contained the lithium-ion battery that burned on a Japan Airlines 787 at Logan Airport in Boston on Jan. 7.
The Federal Aviation Administration grounded all 787 Dreamliners on Jan. 16 after a second battery incident occurred in Japan during an All Nippon Airways flight. The battery emitted smoke and became charred, forcing pilots to make an emergency landing.
The NTSB is assisting Japanese investigators in that incident. Debbie Hersman, the board’s chairwoman, on Thursday called both fires a significant safety concern.
The agency has so far not discovered why the battery caught fire, Hersman said.
The JAL plane was delivered to the airline Dec. 20 and had made 22 flights before the incident, according to the NTSB. The lithium-ion battery that caught fire was produced in September.
Although a fire destroyed one of two big batteries on the 787 parked at the Boston airport, a quick examination of the second battery found “no obvious anomalies,” the NTSB said Sunday.
The second battery was of identical design but used for a different purpose.
The board said its lab was still studying the destroyed battery, whose function was to start the auxiliary power unit, a small jet engine used mostly on the ground. The battery, which was not being charged or discharged, caught fire while the jet was empty after completing a flight to Boston from Tokyo.
The undamaged battery on which the board reported Sunday was a backup for cockpit instruments, near the nose.
On Jan. 16, during an All Nippon Airways domestic flight in Japan, the main battery used to back up cockpit instruments began belching smoke a few minutes after takeoff, forcing an emergency landing. Investigators have not said whether it was being charged at the time. The planes were grounded shortly afterward.
The batteries use a lithium-ion chemistry, which has been in use for many years in many applications but is new in airplanes. Investigators say the problem could be with the batteries or with the associated electronics used to manage them.
The board’s update also said investigators had reviewed two systems associated with the auxiliary power unit and found no problems.
An NTSB-led team also examined circuit boards used to monitor the battery in the in-flight incident in Japan, the board said. The circuit boards were damaged in the incident, “which limited the information that could be obtained from tests,” the board said. ”
The board said it had sent two additional investigators to Seattle, where it was working with the Federal Aviation Administration to review work at Boeing. One investigator will work with a group reviewing Boeing’s efforts to solve the problems, and the other will work on how the lithium-ion batteries were approved by the FAA.
The RTCA, a group that advises the FAA on some technical issues, in 2008 recommended tougher testing standards for lithium-ion batteries on aircraft to ensure they wouldn’t burn or explode even if control circuitry failed, The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday night. The FAA decided such testing wasn’t necessary, and it’s not clear whether it would have prevented the two 787 incidents, the Journal reported.
Japan’s transport ministry said Monday it has ended inspections of battery maker GS Yuasa and will look at Kanto Aircraft Instrument, a battery-monitor maker.

Includes material from
The New York Times

In Japan, Boeing 787 probe shifts to monitoring system

The joint U.S. and Japanese investigation into the Boeing 787's battery problems has shifted from the battery-maker to the manufacturer of a monitoring system.


TOKYO —
The joint U.S. and Japanese investigation into the Boeing 787's battery problems has shifted from the battery-maker to the manufacturer of a monitoring system.
Japan transport ministry official Shigeru Takano said Monday the probe into battery-maker GS Yuasa was over for now as no evidence was found it was the source of the problems.
Ministry officials said they will inspect Kanto Aircraft Instrument Co. on Monday as part of the ongoing investigation. It makes a system that monitors voltage, charging and temperature of the lithium-ion batteries.
All 50 of the Boeing 787s in use around the world are grounded after one of the jets operated by All Nippon Airways made an emergency landing in Japan earlier this month when its main battery overheated. Earlier in January, a battery in a Japan Airlines 787 caught fire while parked at Boston's Logan International Airport.
GS Yuasa shares jumped on the news it is no longer being investigated, gaining nearly 5 percent in Tokyo trading. The issue had plunged 12 percent after the battery problems surfaced in Japan.
Ministry officials stopped short of saying that Kanto's monitoring system was under any special scrutiny, saying it was part of an ongoing investigation.
"We are looking into affiliated parts makers," Takano said. "We are looking into possibilities."
Kyoto-based GS Yuasa declined to comment, noting that the investigation was still underway.
Hideaki Kobayashi, spokesman for Kanto Aircraft, based in Fujisawa, southwest of Tokyo, declined comment. He said it was too early to tell whether its system was behind the problems.
Last week, U.S. federal investigators said the JAL battery that caught fire showed evidence of short-circuiting and a chemical reaction known as "thermal runaway," in which an increase in temperature causes progressively hotter temperatures. It's not clear to investigators which came first, the short-circuiting or the thermal runaway.
Deliveries of the jet dubbed the Dreamliner were three years behind schedule because of manufacturing delays. Much of the aircraft is made by outside manufacturers, many of them major Japanese companies who make about 35 percent of the plane.
It is the first jet to make wide use of lithium-ion batteries, the kind usually found in laptops and other gadgets. They are prone to overheating and require additional systems to avoid fires.
Investigators have been looking at the remnants of the ANA flight's charred battery, but it is unclear whether the battery or a related part was behind its overheating. Investigators have said the ANA battery and the JAL battery did not receive excess voltage.
Japanese carrier All Nippon Airways was the "launch customer" for the 787, and has been forced to cancel services - 643 domestic flights through Feb. 12, affecting 69,000 passengers, and 195 international flights through Feb. 18, affecting 13,620 passengers.
Japan Airlines, which has fewer 787s than ANA, has deployed other aircraft in its fleet, minimizing its flight cancellations.
Boeing, which competes against Airbus of France, has halted 787 deliveries. Boeing has orders for more than 800 of the Dreamliner planes.
The 787 is the first airliner made mostly from lightweight composite materials that boost fuel efficiency. It also relies on electronic systems rather than hydraulic or mechanical systems to a greater degree than any other airliner.
Analysts say customers won't come back to the 787 unless its safety is solidly assured.
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Follow Yuri Kageyama on Twitter at www.twitter.com/yurikageyama