Siap Tandingi Garuda, Apa Saja yang Ditawarkan Batik Air?

(26/4/2013) Anak perusahaan Lion Air, Batik Air, siap melakukan penerbangan komersial perdana pada 3 Mei nanti. Maskapai ini digadang-gadang akan menjadi pesaing berat Garuda Indonesia dalam segmen maskapai full service. Apa saja yang ditawarkan Batik Air untuk bisa berkompetisi dengan Garuda?

Dalam layanannya nanti, Batik Air akan mengoperasikan pesawat baru Boeing 737-900ER, yang dikonfigurasi dengan 12 kursi kelas bisnis dan 168 kursi kelas ekonomi. Di kelas bisnis, penumpang dimanjakan dengan kursi nyaman seluas 45 inch yang dilengkapi dengan layanan hiburan berupa LCD yang terpasang di setiap kursi. Penumpang kelas bisnis juga diizinkan membawa bagasi hingga 30 kg. Sementara di kelas ekonomi memiliki jarak antar kursi 32 inch yang dilengkapi LCD di setiap kursi. Selain itu, penumpang juga diizinkan membawa bagasi hingga 20 kg.

Layanan yang ditawarkan Batik Air tersebut sebenarnya relatif sama dengan yang ditawarkan Garuda Indonesia pada penerbangan domestik dan regional dengan pesawat Boeing 737-800. Garuda mengkonfigurasi pesawat ini dengan 12 kursi kelas bisnis dan 144 kursi kelas ekonomi. Garuda memberikan jarak antar seluas 45 inch di kelas bisnis dan 32 inch di kelas ekonomi. Garuda juga mengijinkan penumpang membawa bagasi masing-masing 30 kg untuk kelas bisnis dan 20 kg di kelas ekonomi. Beberapa pesawat Garuda memang ada yang sudah tua dan tidak menawarkan sistem hiburan, tapi pesawat ini akan segera dipensiunkan pada tahun depan.

Jika kedua maskapai sama-sama menawarkan produk yang berimbang mulai dari pesawat baru, kursi yang nyaman, sistem hiburan di setiap kursi, bagasi gratis, serta penawaran makanan dan minuman gratis, lalu apa keunggulan Batik Air dari Garuda? Batik Air akan menawarkan harga yang lebih murah dibandingkan Garuda. Sebagai contoh, untuk rute Jakarta-Balikpapan sekali jalan Batik Air menawarkan tiket kelas ekonomi seharga Rp 814.000 dan kelas bisnis Rp 3.500.000. Sedangkan Garuda menawarkan harga mulai dari Rp 1.560.000 untuk kelas ekonomi dan Rp 5.025.000 untuk kelas bisnis pada rute yang sama. Di rute lain yang dilayani kedua maskapai, Batik juga menawarkan harga lebih murah.

Meskipun demikian, di segmen premium terkadang penumpang tidak terpengaruh masalah harga. Apalagi Garuda memiliki cukup banyak pelanggan loyal dan korporat. Selain itu, Garuda memiliki banyak koneksi penerbangan internasional di Jakarta, hal yang tidak dimiliki Batik Air. Perusahaan plat merah ini juga memiliki nilai lebih karena pada tahun depan akan bergabung dengan aliansi SkyTeam.

Akan tetapi, Batik Air masih memiliki ruang untuk berkembang. Ekonomi Indonesia terus tumbuh, kalangan kelas menengah juga meningkat. Batik Air bisa menjaring penumpang kalangan menengah yang sebelumnya menggunakan jasa low-cost carrier (LCC) untuk bisa menikmati layanan penerbangan full service namun tidak semahal Garuda.

Di sisi lain, jika Batik Air serius menggarap pasar full service dan memberikan nilai lebih kepada penumpang melebihi Garuda, bukan tidak mungkin pelanggan loyal dan pelanggan korporat Garuda akan berpaling ke Batik Air.

Bagaimanapun upaya Lion Air mendirikan Batik Air untuk bersaing dengan Garuda patut diapresiasi. Untuk melihat keberhasilannya, tentu kita harus menunggu beberapa tahun mendatang.


http://www.indo-aviation.com/2013/04/siap-tandingi-garuda-apa-saja-yang.html

Garuda dan Indonesia AirAsia Kembangkan Medan sebagi Hub Regional

 (26/4/2013) Maskapai penerbangan nasional milik BUMN, Garuda Indonesia, dan maskapai penerbangan murah, Indonesia AirAsia, berencana meningkatkan penerbagan dari ibukota Sumatera Utara, Medan, pada tahun ini. Selain itu, kedua maskapai juga berencana menjadikan kota ini sebagai hub regional dalam beberapa tahun ke depan.

Garuda Indonesia dan Indonesia AirAsia sama-sama akan menghubungkan Medan dengan kota-kota utama dan kota-kota kedua di Indonesia, juga menghubungkannya dengan destinasi wisata di Asia Tenggara.

Seperti diketahui, Garuda Indonesia baru saja membuka rute baru yang menghubungkan antara Medan dengan Batam, Padang, dan Palembang, menggunakan pesawat baru buatan Kanada, Bombardier CRJ1000 NextGen yang berkapasitas 96 penumpang.

Pembukaan rute-rute baru ini merupakan modal awal bagi Garuda untuk mengembangkan Medan sebagai hub baru di masa mendatang. Selain itu, Garuda ingin memperkuat jaringan dan koneksi di Indonesia bagian barat. Medan akan menjadi hub keempat Garuda setelah Jakarta, Denpasar, dan Makassar.

Setelah menghubungkan Medan dengan tiga destinasi baru di Sumatera, perusahaan berencana melakukan ekspansi lebih lanjut dengan membuka layanan penerbangan internasional dari Medan ke Singapura, Kuala Lumpur, Penang, dan Bangkok. Penang di Malaysia akan menjadi destinasi internasional pertama Garuda dari Medan dan akan mulai dilayani pada 1 Juni 2013.

Tidak hanya mengembangkan rute internasional, dalam waktu dekat Garuda juga akan menambah penerbangan domestiknya dari Medan ke kota-kota seperti Pekanbaru dan Banda Aceh. Selain itu, maskapai penerbangan plat merah ini juga akan menghubungkan Medan dengan hub Garuda yang lain ataupun kota besar lain tanpa transit di Jakarta, seperti Medan-Denpasar, Medan-Makasar, dan Medan-Surabaya.

Sementara itu, Indonesia AirAsia memiliki ambisi yang tinggi dalam ekspansinya di Medan. Maskapai penerbangan murah ini akan menghubungkan kembali Medan dengan Jakarta dan Johor Bahru masing-masing pada 16 Mei dan 7 Juni 2013.

Jakarta memang telah menjadi destinasi populer dari Medan karena dua kota ini merupakan pusat bisnis. Rute Medan-Jakarta merupakan rute terpadat kedua di Indonesia setelah Jakarta-Surabaya. Sementara Johor Bahru merupakan kota di Malaysia yang berjarak sangat dekat dengan Singapura. Indonesia AirAsia membidik para wisatawan pada rute Medan-Johor Bahru karena kota ini dikenal sebagai destinasi wisata keluarga. Selain itu, Indonesia AirAsia juga membidik penumpang yang akan ke Singapura melalui Johor Bahru. Apalagi terdapat bus yang dipromosikan AirAsia untuk menghubungkan Bandara Sendai di Johor Bahru dengan Singapura.

Berbeda dengan Garuda yang baru merintis Medan sebagai hub, Indonesia AirAsia telah menjadikan ibukota Sumatera Utara sebagai hub sejak beberapa tahun yang lalu. Maskapai ini telah menempatkan dua pesawat Airbus A320 di Medan untuk melayani enam destinasi baik domestik maupun internasional, di antaranya Surabaya, Bandung, Pekanbaru, Kuala Lumpur, Penang, dan Bangkok.

Untuk mendukung ekspansinya, Indonesia AirAsia akan menambah satu Airbus A320 lagi di Medan dalam waktu dekat. Rencananya, pesawat ini akan digunakan untuk membuka rute ke Jakarta dan Johor Bahru, serta menambah frekuensi penerbangan ke Kuala Lumpur dan Penang. Di masa depan, Indonesia AirAsia berambisi untuk membuka sejumlah rute internasional baru dari Medan ke Phuket, Ho Chi Minh, dan beberapa kota di India.

Sebentar lagi Medan akan memiliki bandara baru, yaitu Bandara Kuala Namu, untuk menggantikan Bandara Polonia yang ada saat ini. Bandara Kuala Namu rencananya beroperasi di bulan September dan memiliki kapasitas 8,1 juta penumpang per tahun ketika dibuka nanti. Tapi kapasitas ini akan ditambah di masa yang akan datang.

Hadirnya Bandara Kuala Namun ini tentu saja menggairahkan bagi maskapai-maskapai penerbangan yang akan berekspansi di Medan, seperti Garuda Indonesia dan Indonesia AirAsia, serta maskapai-maskapai lainnya. Jika dikembangkan dengan baik, Bandara Kuala Namu mungkin tidak hanya sekedar menjadi hub regional, tapi juga hub internasional yang bisa bersaing dengan Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) di Malayasia dan Changi Airport di Singapura.



http://www.indo-aviation.com/2013/04/garuda-dan-indonesia-airasia-kembangkan.html

Diberi Kompensasi, Korban Kecelakaan Lion Air Diminta Bungkam

(26/4/2013) Lion Air mengimbau para penumpang korban kecelakaan pesawat yang jatuh di laut sebelum mendarat di Bandara Ngurah Rai Denpasar untuk tidak mengajukan gugatan hukum terhadap perusahaan.

Pernyataan ini dibuat saat pertemuan antara penumpang dan perwakilan manajemen Lion Air di Arion Swiss Bellhotel Bandung pada Selasa (23/4/2013). Saat itu manajemen Lion Air menawarkan kompensasi kepada penumpang pesawat nahas sebesar Rp 55 juta per penumpang sebagai pengganti kehilangan dan kerusakan bagasi, serta uang kompensasi atas shock yang diderita penumpang setelah kecelakaan (Baca: Lion Air Berikan Kompensasi Rp 55 Juta Pada Korban Kecelakaan di Bali).

Pesawat Lion Air membawa 101 penumpang dan tujuh awak saat kecelakaan di Bali pada 13 April. Seluruh penumpang dan awak pesawat selamat, tapi 52 orang dari mereka harus dirawat di sejumlah rumah sakit di Bali.

Bagi penumpang yang menerima kompensasi wajib menandatangani surat pernyataan yang berisi 12 klausul, di antaranya adalah tidak mengajukan tuntutan hukum kepada Lion Air di kemudian hari. Bahkan, jika hasil penyelidikan KNKT keluar dan menyatakan kecelakaan tersebut terjadi karena human error, penumpang tetap tak bisa menggugat.

Selain itu, penumpang yang telah menerima uang santunan tidak boleh mempublikasikan material apa pun kepada pihak ketiga, termasuk wartawan. Dalam hal ini penumpang juga tidak boleh mengatakan hal-hal yang berkaitan dengan penyebab jatuhnya pesawat.

Risa Suseanty, pembalap sepeda gunung nasional, merupakan salah satu penumpang yang menolak tawaran Lion Air. Suseanty berencana menunggu hasil investigasi KNKT sebelum memutuskan langkah berikutnya.

Gandhi Nurima, penumpang lain dalam penerbangan tersebut, mengatakan seperti yang dikutip Indo Aviation dari The Jakarta Post bahwa dia harus memikirkan tawaran itu karena dia mengambil asuransi tambahan yang ditawarkan Lion Air saat pembelian tiket. Menurut paket asuransi tambahan yang dibeli Gandhi, jika terjadi evakuasi dalam penerbangan, dia dapat melakukan klaim hingga Rp 200 juta.

Gandhi bingung dengan salah satu klausul dalam tawaran kompensasi Lion Air, karena dalam klausul tersebut menyebutkan bahwa penumpang tidak dapat mengajukan tuntutan terhadap perusahaan atau melakukan klaim asuransi. Menurut Gandhi, jika dia menandatangani kesepakatan ini, berarti perusahaan bebas dari tanggung jawab klaim asuransi yang besarnya maksimal Rp 200 juta tersebut.

Di sisi lain, Nur Selviana, salah seorang penumpang yang menerima kompensasi Rp 55 juta yang diberikan Lion Air, mengatakan bahwa kejadian itu merupakan sebuah kecelakaan. Nur Selviana berterima kasih atas kompensasi yang diberikan dan sangat bersyukur bisa selamat dari kecelakaan.


http://www.indo-aviation.com/2013/04/diberi-kompensasi-korban-kecelakaan.html 

Ini Rute Internasional Bidikan Garuda Indonesia

(26/4/2013) Selain membuka banyak rute penerbangan domestik, maskapai penerbangan nasional Garuda Indonesia tahun ini juga berencana membuka sejumlah rute penerbangan internasional. Rute-rute mana saja yang menjadi bidikan Garuda?

Dari home base-nya di Jakarta, Garuda Indonesia hanya berencana membuka dua rute penerbangan internasional, yaitu membuka kembali layanan penerbangan Jakarta-Perth nonstop pada 28 Juni, dan membuka rute baru Jakarta-London Gatwick yang akan dibuka pada 1 November mendatang. Jakarta-Perth akan dioperasikan dengan Boeing 737-800, sedangkan Jakarta-London dengan Boeing 777-300ER yang dilengkapi dengan layanan First Class. Penerbangan Jakarta-London akan dilayani Garuda sebanyak lima penerbangan seminggu.

Denpasar merupakan hub Garuda yang paling banyak mendapatkan tambahan rute internasional. Dari Denpasar setidaknya Garuda sudah mengincar lima destinasi internasional, antara lain Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Taipei, Brisbane, dan Auckland. Denpasar-Auckland merupakan rute yang akan dioperasikan dengan pesawat widebody Airbus A330. Sementara empat rute lainnya bisa dilayani dengan Boeing 737-800. Meskipun demikian, belum bisa dipastikan kapan pembukaan rute-rute ini akan terlaksana.

Rencana Garuda membuka hingga lima rute baru dari Denpasar menunjukkan bahwa Bali masih dianggap sebagai destinasi populer bagi turis asing. Jumlah turis yang berkunjung ke Bali dari waktu ke waktu juga terus meningkat baik yang berasal dari negara-negara Asia Tenggara, Asia Timur, maupun Australia.

Pada hub terbarunya di Medan, Garuda setidaknya akan membuka empat rute internasional. Rute yang sudah masuk dalam incaran Garuda seperti Medan-Penang, Medan-Kuala Lumpur, Medan-Bangkok, dan Medan-Singapura. Rute-rute ini diproyeksikan untuk diterbangi pesawat buatan Kanada, Bombardier CRJ1000 NextGen, kecuali Medan-Singapura yang akan dilayani dengan Boeing 737-800. Penang akan menjadi destinasi internasional pertama Garuda dari Medan karena karena akan diterbangi maskapai ini pada 1 Juni 2013. Bahkan, kemungkinan Garuda akan langsung melayani rute ini dua kali sehari.

Surabaya merupakan kota di luar hub Garuda yang akan dihubungkan dengan destinasi internasional. Garuda berharap bisa membuka kembali layanan Surabaya-Singapura yang dulu pernah dilayaninya sebelum akhirnya ditutup. Kini rute ini sudah cukup ramai dengan dilayani oleh lima maskapai penerbangan, yaitu Silk Air, Jetstar/Valuair, China Airlines, Lion Air, dan Mandala Airlines. Masing-masing maskapai melayani satu penerbangan sehari, kecuali Silk Air yang melayani dua kali sehari.

Nah, apakah seluruh rute bidikan Garuda Indonesia tersebut bisa terwujud sepanjang tahun 2013 ini? Untuk mengetahui jawabannya, paling tidak kita masih harus menunggu hingga akhir tahun.




www.indo-aviation.com/2013/04/ini-rute-internasional-bidikan-garuda.html

China’s CAS signs GTA with Airbus for 60 aircraft

Eco-efficient Airbus aircraft support fast growing Chinese civil aviation

25 April 2013 Press Release

China Aviation Supplies Holding Company (CAS) has signed a General Terms Agreement (GTA) with Airbus for the purchase of 60 Airbus aircraft, which includes 42 A320 Family aircraft and 18 A330 aircraft.

The GTA was signed today at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing by Li Hai, President and CEO of CAS and Fabrice Brégier, President and CEO of Airbus in the presence of the visiting French President François Hollande and the Chinese President Xi Jinping. It was part of a series of France-China agreements signed today.  

“We are delighted to receive a new order from our long-standing customer CAS for both the Airbus best-selling single aisle A320 Family and wide-body A330 Family,” said Fabrice Brégier, President and CEO of Airbus. “The A320’s high reliability and low operational cost has made it very popular with Chinese airlines. As congestion puts pressure on airports in large cities in China, the A330 is an excellent solution as larger aircraft can transport more passengers with less flights. The comfort of the A330’s spacious cabin is also appealing to passengers. These eco-efficient Airbus aircraft will contribute to the growth and success of China’s aviation sector,” said Fabrice Brégier.

By the end of March 2013, there were some 750 A320 Family aircraft in operation with 14 Chinese airlines and more than 110 A330s in operation with six operators.

More than 9,400 A320 Family aircraft have been ordered and more than 5,500 delivered to more than 385 customers and operators worldwide reaffirming its position as the world’s best-selling single-aisle aircraft Family. With 99.7 per cent reliability and extended servicing periods, the A320 Family has the lowest operating costs of any single aisle aircraft. Uniquely, the A320 Family offers a containerized cargo system, which is compatible with the worldwide standard wide-body system.

The A330 Family, which spans 250 to 300 seats, and includes Freighter, VIP, and Military Transport/Tanker variants, has now attracted more than 1,200 orders, with around 900 aircraft flying with some 90 operators worldwide. Ever since the original version of the A330-300 entered service, the hallmark has been its very efficient operating economics. Thanks to the introduction of numerous product improvements, it still remains the most cost-efficient and capable aircraft in its class and the family is achieving average dispatch reliability above 99 percent.

airbus.com

LAN and TAM take delivery of first Airbus A320s with Sharklets

LAN and TAM Airlines, two of Latin America’s leading airlines and part of the LATAM Airlines Group -- one of Airbus largest customers in terms of orders, in-service aircraft and backlog -- took delivery of their first Airbus A320s equipped with Sharklets. Powered by CFM, the LAN and TAM aircraft were delivered this week and will begin operating domestic routes within Chile and Brazil. The two airlines combined have ordered 380 aircraft and have more than 240 aircraft in operation. Their joint Airbus backlog totals nearly 180 aircraft.

Sharklets are made from light-weight composites and are 2.4 meters tall. They are an option on new-build A320 Family aircraft and allow Airbus’ airline customers to reduce fuel burn up to four percent over longer sectors and reduce approximately 1,000 tons of CO2 emissions per aircraft per year. Sharklets offer operators the flexibility of either adding an additional 100 nautical miles range or increased payload capability of up to 450 kilograms.


airbus.com

EADS and Airbus donate four million RMB to earthquake hit Ya’an city in South western China

Eurocopter, another EADS subsidiary also contributes to disaster relief operations

24 April 2013 Press Release

Airbus and its parent company EADS have donated a total of RMB 4 million (about US$647,200) to the earthquake hit area of Ya’an, Sichuan province, in south west of China via the National Development and Reform Commission of China (NDRC).

Eurocopter, another subsidy of EADS has also contributed to the disaster relief operations. Since 21^st April, two Eurocopter helicopters, EC120 and EC135, have been deployed on the earthquake site. Moreover, Eurocopter China will provide special technical and financial support to its Sichuan based private operator, Sichuan Xilin Fengteng General Aviation Cmpany from Guanghan, for the operation of the two helicopters, on request of the Authorities, to participate to the disaster relief air rescue missions.

Airbus China has expressed its intention to contribute to the after-quake reconstruction of Ya’an through supporting students in need in the area.

A quake measured at magnitude 7.0 on the Richter scale, struck Ya’an on Saturday morning, leaving more than 200 people dead missing and more than 11,000 injured. The number of casualties is expected increase as the rescue efforts continue. 

airbus.com

FAA, Boeing delegated much of 787 testing

The second day of a National Transportation and Safety Board hearing shed new light on how regulators delegated to Boeing — and Boeing in turn delegated to its hierarchy of suppliers — much of the responsibility for testing and certifying the plane’s design.

Federal regulators certifying the safety of the 787’s lithium-ion batteries never visited the battery’s manufacturer in Japan nor the company that designed the surrounding battery system in France, according to testimony at an investigative hearing Wednesday.
That was one of the jobs entrusted to Boeing employees who were handling much of the Federal Aviation Administration’s detail work on certification of the plane’s new technology, officials at the companies told the National Transportation and Safety Board (NTSB) hearing.
The hearing shed new light on how regulators delegated to Boeing — and Boeing in turn delegated to its hierarchy of suppliers — much of the responsibility for testing and certifying the plane’s design.
Thales of France, which designed the battery system, was responsible for providing test data and paperwork to Boeing for certification.
But lacking any experience in certifying lithium-ion batteries, Thales in turn depended on the expertise of battery maker GS Yuasa of Japan, said Thierry Queste, a 787 project manager with the French company.
Boeing officials insisted that, despite the outsourcing to Thales of the design work for the first large lithium-ion batteries on a commercial airliner, its engineers maintained control.
“Boeing was involved and had complete oversight of the suppliers throughout,” senior Boeing systems engineer Jerry Hulm told the NTSB panel.
And FAA officials were equally adamant that their technical experts were “heavily engaged” in the 787’s certification.
However, the FAA oversight role portrayed by agency officials in many respects was indirect — almost like a back-seat driver, with Boeing up front — because of an enormous disparity in resources between the jet maker and its regulator.
The head of the Renton-based FAA certification office, Ali Bahrami, said he has 20 to 25 staff working full time on the 787. The entire airplane-certification division of the federal agency has fewer than 1,300 employees nationwide to cover at least six current new airplane-certification programs as well as ongoing airworthiness issues.
So the FAA relies in large part on 950 engineers who are paid by Boeing but work as FAA “authorized representatives” to oversee and approve the certification of the 787 and other Boeing jets.
It was such authorized reps who traveled to Japan to witness and sign off on GS Yuasa’s battery-certification tests.
“It would be virtually impossible to keep up with industry” without this extensive delegation of oversight to the manufacturer, said Dorenda Baker, director of the FAA’s national aircraft-certification unit.
The revelations came on the second day of an investigative hearing in Washington, D.C. The inquiry arose out of a battery fire on a 787 parked at Boston’s Logan International Airport in January, and an incident a week later when a smoldering battery in-flight forced an emergency landing and slide evacuation in Japan.
The FAA subsequently grounded the Dreamliner — a directive lifted only this week after three months of paralyzed airplanes.
A detailed analysis of the safety risks of the new battery system was required to prepare for certification, and company officials described it as a collaborative effort.
Boeing identified the potential impact of anything going wrong at the airplane level, and the suppliers assessed the risks of their particular pieces going wrong.
“Every step of the way, safety reviews were held by all parties,” said Thales program manager Sandra Voglino.
Those efforts — “top down and bottom up,” in Hulm’s words — combined to create projections that, for example, a battery wouldn’t create a smoke hazard more than once in 10 million flight hours. Though approved by the FAA, that assessment didn’t pan out in service. Yet Hulm believes the process wasn’t flawed.
“I don’t know, except for 20/20 hindsight, what we could have done differently,” he said.
The testing needed to win certification was also developed and carried out in close collaboration. “Many of the suppliers are in-house, sitting across the row from our engineers,” Hulm said.
Queste emphasized that Thales is “in permanent contact with Boeing, GS Yuasa and Securaplane,” the maker of the battery charger.
Interviewed by phone after the hearing, NTSB chairman Deborah Hersman said that her team has recently visited Thales in France and will go to Japan to visit GS Yuasa.
She said she hopes to publish a final report by year end that will reach conclusions about whether all the parties to the 787 battery system certification — including “at the regulator, contractor and subcontractor levels” — had the necessary resources and expertise to do the job.
Hersman seems determined to push hard for answers. At one point in Wednesday’s hearing, a Boeing lawyer objected to the direction of the panel’s questioning, which he characterized as speculation that the cause of the January battery incidents was a “design defect.”
Hersman politely acknowledged his point, then resumed the line of questioning.


seattletimes.com

FAA pegs cost of 787 battery fix at $465,000 per plane

The FAA formally lifted the grounding of Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner fleet and estimated the battery-system modifications will cost United almost $465,000 per airplane, though Boeing will likely cover that tab.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) formally lifted the grounding of Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner fleet, effective Friday, ending the embarrassing and costly episode after 14 weeks and two days.
The FAA estimates the cost to airlines of modifying each jet with two of Boeing’s beefed-up batteries, containment boxes and venting tubes at $464,678.
For United, the sole U.S. operator of the jet with six 787s in service, that’s a total modification cost of $2.8 million.
However, the directive notes this cost “may be covered under warranty” from Boeing. The jet-maker is very likely to pick up this entire cost for all its customers.
At just over $23 million for all 50 jets in service worldwide, that’s a small fraction of the cost to the airlines from lost revenue while their planes were grounded.
In a quarterly earnings teleconference with analysts Wednesday, Boeing CEO Jim McNerney said “there are no contractual obligations” to compensate airlines for that lost revenue.
“But having said that, there are a few places where we’ll work with our customers,” McNerney added.
Rather than cash, that privately negotiated compensation may take the form of price breaks on future maintenance costs or jet purchases.
United took a smaller hit than some other carriers, since it was able to substitute different aircraft from its fleet and did not have to cancel any routes.
The airline’s lost revenue was only about $11 million, Chief Financial Officer John Rainey said on a quarterly earnings call with analysts Thursday.
The 787s were grounded Jan. 16 after two battery-overheating incidents: a battery fire on an empty 787 parked at the gate at Boston airport, then a smoldering battery on a flight in Japan that forced an emergency landing.
The FAA directive notes that though the root causes of both incidents have not yet been established, Boeing’s fix for the battery system — which the agency reviewed, then approved April 19 — “considered all potential causal factors of the two recent battery incidents.”
The FAA said the directive will “allow the aircraft to return to service as soon as possible,” once Boeing’s battery fix is installed. Still, it will be weeks before full service is resumed.
In addition to carrying out the modifications, which take about five days per airplane, airlines must reposition aircraft, refresh crew training, fly some check flights, then reactivate and sell tickets for routes that have been suspended, including Seattle-Tokyo.
It will be at least June before all 50 jets already delivered are back in scheduled service and the three-month backlog of undelivered 787s sitting in Everett is cleared.


seattletimes.com

FAA, Boeing delegated much of 787 testing

The second day of a National Transportation and Safety Board hearing shed new light on how regulators delegated to Boeing — and Boeing in turn delegated to its hierarchy of suppliers — much of the responsibility for testing and certifying the plane’s design.


Federal regulators certifying the safety of the 787’s lithium-ion batteries never visited the battery’s manufacturer in Japan nor the company that designed the surrounding battery system in France, according to testimony at an investigative hearing Wednesday.
That was one of the jobs entrusted to Boeing employees who were handling much of the Federal Aviation Administration’s detail work on certification of the plane’s new technology, officials at the companies told the National Transportation and Safety Board (NTSB) hearing.
The hearing shed new light on how regulators delegated to Boeing — and Boeing in turn delegated to its hierarchy of suppliers — much of the responsibility for testing and certifying the plane’s design.
Thales of France, which designed the battery system, was responsible for providing test data and paperwork to Boeing for certification.
But lacking any experience in certifying lithium-ion batteries, Thales in turn depended on the expertise of battery maker GS Yuasa of Japan, said Thierry Queste, a 787 project manager with the French company.
Boeing officials insisted that, despite the outsourcing to Thales of the design work for the first large lithium-ion batteries on a commercial airliner, its engineers maintained control.
“Boeing was involved and had complete oversight of the suppliers throughout,” senior Boeing systems engineer Jerry Hulm told the NTSB panel.
And FAA officials were equally adamant that their technical experts were “heavily engaged” in the 787’s certification.
However, the FAA oversight role portrayed by agency officials in many respects was indirect — almost like a back-seat driver, with Boeing up front — because of an enormous disparity in resources between the jet maker and its regulator.
The head of the Renton-based FAA certification office, Ali Bahrami, said he has 20 to 25 staff working full time on the 787. The entire airplane-certification division of the federal agency has fewer than 1,300 employees nationwide to cover at least six current new airplane-certification programs as well as ongoing airworthiness issues.
So the FAA relies in large part on 950 engineers who are paid by Boeing but work as FAA “authorized representatives” to oversee and approve the certification of the 787 and other Boeing jets.
It was such authorized reps who traveled to Japan to witness and sign off on GS Yuasa’s battery-certification tests.
“It would be virtually impossible to keep up with industry” without this extensive delegation of oversight to the manufacturer, said Dorenda Baker, director of the FAA’s national aircraft-certification unit.
The revelations came on the second day of an investigative hearing in Washington, D.C. The inquiry arose out of a battery fire on a 787 parked at Boston’s Logan International Airport in January, and an incident a week later when a smoldering battery in-flight forced an emergency landing and slide evacuation in Japan.
The FAA subsequently grounded the Dreamliner — a directive lifted only this week after three months of paralyzed airplanes.
A detailed analysis of the safety risks of the new battery system was required to prepare for certification, and company officials described it as a collaborative effort.
Boeing identified the potential impact of anything going wrong at the airplane level, and the suppliers assessed the risks of their particular pieces going wrong.
“Every step of the way, safety reviews were held by all parties,” said Thales program manager Sandra Voglino.
Those efforts — “top down and bottom up,” in Hulm’s words — combined to create projections that, for example, a battery wouldn’t create a smoke hazard more than once in 10 million flight hours. Though approved by the FAA, that assessment didn’t pan out in service. Yet Hulm believes the process wasn’t flawed.
“I don’t know, except for 20/20 hindsight, what we could have done differently,” he said.
The testing needed to win certification was also developed and carried out in close collaboration. “Many of the suppliers are in-house, sitting across the row from our engineers,” Hulm said.
Queste emphasized that Thales is “in permanent contact with Boeing, GS Yuasa and Securaplane,” the maker of the battery charger.
Interviewed by phone after the hearing, NTSB chairman Deborah Hersman said that her team has recently visited Thales in France and will go to Japan to visit GS Yuasa.
She said she hopes to publish a final report by year end that will reach conclusions about whether all the parties to the 787 battery system certification — including “at the regulator, contractor and subcontractor levels” — had the necessary resources and expertise to do the job.
Hersman seems determined to push hard for answers. At one point in Wednesday’s hearing, a Boeing lawyer objected to the direction of the panel’s questioning, which he characterized as speculation that the cause of the January battery incidents was a “design defect.”
Hersman politely acknowledged his point, then resumed the line of questioning.


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China signs deal to buy 60 Airbus jetliners

China has signed an agreement to purchase 60 Airbus jetliners during a visit to Beijing by French President Francois Hollande.

BEIJING —
China has signed an agreement to purchase 60 Airbus jetliners during a visit to Beijing by French President Francois Hollande.
Airbus said that Thursday's agreement covers the purchase of 42 A320s and 18 A330s. The announcement gave no details of price or when the aircraft would be delivered.
Toulouse, France-based Airbus and its American rival Boeing Co. expect China to grow to rival the United States as their biggest market over the coming two decades.
China's purchases of foreign aircraft are dictated by the government, which makes those big-ticket items political leverage. Purchases often are announced in connection with high-level official contacts.
France reported a $34 billion trade deficit with China last year and accounts for less than 2 percent of Chinese foreign trade.
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Airbus: http://www.airbus.com


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Higher fares help Southwest Airlines' profit

Higher fares helped Southwest Airlines Co. make more money than Wall Street expected in the first quarter, but the company said Thursday that automatic federal spending cuts could hurt revenue in April.

DALLAS —
Higher fares helped Southwest Airlines Co. make more money than Wall Street expected in the first quarter, but the company said Thursday that automatic federal spending cuts could hurt revenue in April.
The average passenger fare on Southwest is now more than $150 one-way, 4 percent higher than a year ago.
The airline also gave details on a new policy for no-shows, and it outlined changes for its operation in Atlanta, where it competes with Delta Air Lines Inc.
Southwest didn't fly to Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, the world's busiest airport, until it bought AirTran Airways in 2011. AirTran uses Atlanta as a hub through which passengers connected to other flights, but starting this fall Southwest will turn it into a point-to-point operation primarily serving people going to or from the city.
The change, Southwest officials said, should make their operation more productive and boost its local traffic there.
Southwest announced those changes as it reported that first-quarter net income fell 40 percent to $59 million, or 8 cents per share. That's down from earnings of $98 million, or 13 cents per share, a year ago, when the airline booked $116 million in net one-time gains, mostly from fuel-hedging contracts.
Without special items such as fuel hedging, Southwest would have earned 7 cents per share, topping analysts' forecast of 2 cents per share, and reversing an adjusted loss of 2 cents per share last year.
Revenue totaled $4.08 billion, up 2 percent from a year ago. Analysts expected $4.07 billion, according to FactSet.
Southwest shares finished steady at $13.42 on Thursday after trading in a range of $13.31 to $13.61 during the day.
Southwest said that revenue was weaker than expected in March and so far in April. Automatic budget cuts that went into effect in March have caused federal agencies to cut back on travel. The company said that it's "cautious" because of the potential effect of those cuts, but that recent bookings for May and June are "solid."
Lower prices for fuel - Southwest's biggest expense - offset the slump in revenue in April. Its first-quarter fuel bill fell 3.5 percent compared with the same period last year, to $1.46 billion.
Southwest estimated its second-quarter fuel cost at $3 to $3.05 per gallon, less than a year ago and below its forecast for 2013.
The airline also unveiled details of a new no-show policy for passengers using its lowest, nonrefundable Wanna Get Away and Ding! fares. Beginning with reservations made on or after May 10, no-shows will lose the value of the unused part of their itinerary and the rest of the reservation will be canceled.
Unlike most airlines, Southwest doesn't charge a fee to change a ticket, and it lets customers apply the amount of unused tickets to new bookings. But the airline believes that the policy results in seats going unsold when passengers fail to show up.
On a conference call with analysts, CEO Gary Kelly was quizzed repeatedly about a glossy new advertising campaign that, unlike many previous ones, doesn't mention Southwest's policy of letting customers check two bags for free.
The analysts wanted to know if the ad blitz indicated that Southwest is preparing to charge for bags. Many of them believe that Southwest could make lots more revenue by charging for bags. Kelly suggested that the analysts were parsing the commercials too closely, but he didn't close the door on bag fees someday.
"There's no intent here to change the positioning of Southwest Airlines' brand with this ad campaign," Kelly said. "Our brand includes `bags fly free,' period."
Southwest still believes the bag policy draws customers. Kelly said it would lose $1 billion a year if it started charging for bags. But, he added, "I don't want us to be pinned down into perpetuity on what we might or might not do."



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After 1Q loss, United sees operations improving

United Airlines says it's on the way to fixing the reliability problems that have driven away travelers. Now it needs to reliably make money.

United Airlines says it's on the way to fixing the reliability problems that have driven away travelers. Now it needs to reliably make money.
The airline's parent company reported a $417 million first-quarter loss on Thursday. CEO Jeff Smisek was disappointed with the financial result, but said the airline is making strides in customer service that will eventually help the bottom line.
United is giving customer service training to airport workers and flight attendants worldwide, including those who fly on regional airlines hired by United. New software is supposed to make it easier for gate agents and ticket counter workers to manage flights. United is spending more on maintenance and has changed how it handles spare parts to make its planes more reliable.
Last quarter, international flights arrived on-time 80 percent of the time in the quarter, up from 75 percent a year earlier.
Many of the company's problems became evident more than a year ago when United switched to single computer systems for handling passenger information. The result was delays and frustration, especially for prized business travelers.
"We've gotten back to focusing on the basics," Smisek said.
Still, United's performance lagged the industry. The first quarter is a slow travel period, and is often a money-loser for airlines. This year, however, United's biggest rival, Delta Air Lines, posted a small profit. Southwest Airlines and US Airways made money as well.
United shares fell 50 cents to close at $30.89.
There were still some issues, although some were out of United's control. The grounding of Boeing's 787 meant that six United jets intended for long-haul flights were parked for the whole quarter. The grounding cost United $11 million during the quarter, and the planes won't fly again until next month, the airline said.
The Federal Aviation Administration estimated the cost to fix the six planes at $2.8 million, although it's likely that Boeing will bear much or all of that cost.
The parked 787s meant that United cut flying even more than it had planned for the quarter. Flying capacity shrank about 5 percent. The airline said capacity will shrink 0.75 percent to 1.75 percent for the full year, in part because of the 787. It plans to start 787 flights from Denver to Tokyo on June 10. Flights from Los Angeles to Tokyo and Shanghai and from Houston to Lagos, Nigeria begin in August.
United is also fighting a turf war with Virgin America for flights from California to New York. Alluding to Virgin, United said another airline added flights this month from Los Angeles and San Francisco, often at a 20 percent discount to previous fares. United has matched those fares. The cheaper flights have boosted demand, prompting United to put more planes on the route.
United said it lost some business due to government spending cuts that began in March. United's government passenger travel fell 25 percent in the quarter, but it downplayed the impact, saying that category accounts for only 2 percent of overall passenger revenue.
Smisek said about 20,000 United passengers per day are being affected by delays resulting from furloughs to air traffic controllers that began Sunday. United hasn't had to cancel any mainline flights because of the delays, but it has canceled flights by regional partners.
"We are disappointed that the FAA chose this path that maximizes customer disruptions and damage to airlines instead of choosing a less disruptive method to comply with its budget obligations," Smisek said.
The FAA said it is doing its best to work with airlines to minimize delays.
United's loss for the quarter amounted to $1.26 per share. A year earlier, it lost $448 million, or $1.36 per share, in 2012's first quarter. The Chicago-based airline would have lost 98 cents per share excluding one-time charges, including $70 million in expenses related to its merger with Continental. That beat analyst expectations for a loss of $1.09 per share.
Revenue rose a little more than 1 percent to $8.72 billion. A measure of fares paid per mile rose 1.9 percent, though costs outpaced the fare growth. Per-seat costs rose about 7 percent.
Fuel expenses fell 6 percent, helped by less flying, slightly lower prices per gallon, and bets on fuel prices. But labor costs jumped 12 percent. United Continental Holdings Inc. has been signing new wage deals that cover workers who came from both airlines, including a new pilot contract approved in December.
Analysts expect United to return to profitability in the second quarter, which includes the start of the summer travel season. Current estimates are for a profit of $1.98 per share.
 

 

 

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FAA ready to send 787 back to the skies

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is expected to approve the Boeing 787 Dreamliner’s return to passenger service as early as Friday afternoon.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is expected to approve the Boeing 787 Dreamliner’s return to passenger service as early as Friday afternoon.
Barring unforeseen last-minute hitches, Boeing’s new airplane will finally be allowed back in the air — three months after the fleet was grounded worldwide in the wake of two incidents in January in which the plane’s lithium-ion batteries overheated.
A person familiar with the details said federal officials were preparing late Thursday to issue the go-ahead. That means the FAA approves of the Dreamliner with Boeing’s new safety-enhanced lithium-ion battery system installed.
Since Boeing completed a series of 20 preapproved tests of its new battery system April 5, the aviation business has been buzzing with speculation as to when the FAA would arrive at a decision.
Some in the industry believed the agency would not act before a National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) hearing scheduled for next Tuesday and Wednesday.
That hearing arises out of an NTSB investigation of a battery fire in January aboard a Japan Airlines 787 on the ground in Boston. It will discuss how the original battery passed muster at Boeing then made it through the FAA’s original certification process.
In forthright briefings on its investigation over the past three months, the NTSB has made clear it is still seeking the root cause of the overheating and fire.
But because the fire destroyed the evidence, the root cause may ultimately prove elusive, and so Boeing designed a fix it believes will cover all bases.
Its solution, according to the person with knowledge of the details, is good enough to satisfy the FAA, which acts independently of the NTSB.
The battery fix includes, for each of the two large batteries on board, a steel containment box that can withstand an explosion equivalent to the maximum energy the battery can hold.
And from each battery a titanium tube connects to the fuselage skin and will vent any gases from an explosion safely outside the aircraft.
Various internal modifications to the battery — chiefly electrical and thermal insulation between the battery’s eight cells — are designed to stop any overheating from spreading cell to cell, minimizing any chance of a so-called “ thermal runaway.”
Technically, the FAA green light will apply only to the sole U.S. operator of the 787, United Airlines, which has taken delivery of six Dreamliners.
However, FAA approval of Boeing’s battery fix clears the way for civil-aviation authorities in other countries to follow suit and allow their carriers to fly again.
Typically, other regulators promptly follow the FAA’s lead.
Procedurally, the airplanes cannot fly until the FAA issues a new Airworthiness Directive to supersede the one that grounded the planes Jan. 16.
That likely won’t happen Friday and may take a couple of days, just because of the time involved to publish a move in the Federal Register.
However, that won’t hold anyone back in practical terms.
As soon as the FAA makes its approval public, United Airlines will be free to start modifying its aircraft and installing the new battery system on its jets.
The work will take several days per airplane.
United said earlier this month it would resume 787 passenger service May 31.
A few planes may be flying before then, but it may take until June before some airlines regain full regular service.
After the batteries are installed, flight crews will undergo some retraining, and routes that have been canceled must be reactivated and tickets sold.
Boeing has teams of mechanics ready, some already deployed across the globe, to begin the work as soon as the FAA gives the green light.
The 50 Dreamliners in the worldwide in-service fleet are scattered across the globe, in Chile, Ethiopia, India, Japan, Poland, Qatar as well as the United States.
The response of the Japanese Civil Aviation Board will be crucial, for All Nippon Airways and Japan Airlines operate 24 of the 50 grounded jets.
Boeing’s teams are poised to fan out and get to work over the weekend.
The FAA’s decision was signaled Thursday when the agency granted Boeing permission to fly routine pre-delivery check flights, without passengers.
Boeing flew 787 Dreamliner No. 83, complete with its new battery system, on such a check flight Thursday from Paine Field in Everett to Moses Lake and back.


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Up to 700 engineers at Boeing losing jobs

Boeing says it will lay off as many as 700 engineers this year, with the first notices going out Friday, as it cuts overall engineering employment by up to 1,700 positions.

Boeing has begun to ax engineering jobs at its local commercial-airplanes unit as its latest jet programs shift from development to production, and will lay off as many as 700 manufacturing engineers this year.
Managers learned Thursday that Boeing aims to reduce the engineering staff by up to 1,700 positions by the end of the year through attrition and layoffs.
Layoff notices to the first 100 of those employees are going out Friday.
An internal “talking points” memo for managers states that further layoffs in other areas of engineering are possible and that it will be “18 or more months” before hiring of engineers resumes.
In an email, Mike Delaney, vice president of engineering, said the reduction is needed because development work is complete on the 747-8, the 787-9 and the KC-45 Air Force tanker.
Downsizing as new jet programs transition to more routine production has been a cyclical pattern at Boeing over the decades.
Delaney’s email cited another factor, too: The layoffs might have been avoided, he said, if Boeing had launched its 787-10 and 777X programs.
At one time, both programs were expected to launch last year. It’s now widely anticipated that both will launch later this year.
“I realize this news may be surprising,” Delaney wrote. “Commercial Airplanes has been on an upswing for several years. We continue to ramp up production on our major programs, and the prospect for future development work is very positive.”
Boeing clearly still needs many engineers on the 737 MAX jet-development program, but “overall, we must reduce our Engineering employment level by 1,500 to 1,700 positions during 2013,” Delaney wrote.
He said Boeing has “significantly scaled back external hiring” in the past year and since last October has let go almost 700 contract employees.
“We hope to mitigate the number of layoffs through the reductions we are making in contract labor, by natural attrition and by not filling many open positions,” Delaney wrote. “Unfortunately and unavoidably we must take additional actions.”
The bottom line is that “through the rest of 2013 we will issue 60-day layoff notices to as many as 700 employees.”
He said the first layoff notices will go out Friday to 100 manufacturing engineers (MEs).
Last week, a manager on the 787 program sent an email to the manufacturing engineers warning them of an imminent downsizing.
The internal “talking points” memo states the 700 announced layoffs focus on MEs in the Puget Sound region and that “future layoffs could impact other parts of ... Engineering.”
The memo also says engineering staffing at Boeing South Carolina “does not require reductions.”
Ray Goforth, executive director of Boeing’s white-collar union, the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace (SPEEA), said he’s concerned Boeing is cutting employees at the same time as it is sending engineering work offshore.
“I’m disappointed that work is being outsourced to the Moscow Design Center while people here are being laid off,” said Goforth.
Rich Plunkett, SPEEA’s director of strategic development, said a manufacturing engineer (ME) who does “installation planning” on the 787 program — working out the sequence of production and the order in which parts are installed during jet assembly — reported he’s been told “throw all the installation planning you can direct to Moscow.”
According to Plunkett, the ME planner said his function “will revert to simply managing the work of the Design Center in Moscow.”
In response, Boeing spokesman Doug Alder said, “The Moscow Design Center has also come down from its peak employment numbers, just like other areas of the company.”
Delaney’s message underlines the importance of Boeing’s 787-10 and 777X programs, while at the same time suggesting that delays in deciding to move forward with those programs have been very consequential.
“Potential development programs for the 787-10X and 777X, which might have provided opportunities to avoid these layoffs, have not been formally approved and launched,” he wrote.
Early in 2012, then-CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes Jim Albaugh spoke publicly of putting a 777X proposal to the company’s board in Chicago by the end of that year, with a go-ahead on the 787-10 perhaps coming even before that.
But by last fall, after Albaugh abruptly resigned in June, that talk faded. Boeing’s board has not announced a decision on either program.
“The challenge we are facing is that those yet-to-be-launched programs are too far out for us to maintain present levels of employment,” Delaney said.
The internal “talking points” memo pins down the gap in engineering requirements.
“This creates a lengthy time period (18 or more months) before workforce needs for those programs would begin rising to current levels,” the memo states.
And yet, the aviation industry certainly considers both programs still on the near-term horizon.
The Boeing board is expected to meet this month to approve offering the 777X. That is one step before a formal launch, which would typically follow within months.
Likewise, the 787-10X is also expected to launch this year.
Launch of either or both programs normally would trigger an uptick in engineering needs.
Boeing’s Alder said the layoffs do not indicate any further delay to 777X or 787-10.
“Our timing for both remains the same,” Alder said. “There is no impact to study and development on either.”
Delaney’s email to his managers expressed regret at the need for layoffs.
“This has been a difficult decision,” Delaney wrote. “We know layoffs impact individuals and families.”
Last month, Boeing announced layoffs of 800 machinists working on the 787 and 747-8 programs.
Boeing also is considering the move of some airline customer engineering support to Long Beach, Calif., and will move significant IT support work to St. Louis and North Charleston, S.C.


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Kenneth Holtby, major designer of Boeing aircraft, dies

Kenneth F. Holtby, a key designer of Boeing aircraft who retired in 1987, died at age 90.

Kenneth F. Holtby was a key designer on several best-selling Boeing aircraft that revolutionized the airline industry, and he served as general manager on three successive jets.
After 40 years working at the aerospace giant, Mr. Holtby retired in 1987 as Boeing’s top technical engineer. He died March 27 at age 90.
Mr. Holtby served in the U.S. Air Corps during World War II before finishing his aeronautic studies at Caltech. He began working as an aerospace engineer at Boeing in 1947, and became chief of the aerodynamics staff six years later — first at Wichita, and in Renton . In 1962, he became a Sloan Fellow at MIT — a yearlong fellowship offered to managers exhibiting notable success to become even stronger leaders.
Mr. Holtby helped shape Boeing’s 747, 757 and 767 commercial jetliners with his wide-ranging grasp of airplane design. Some engineers specialize, but Mr. Holtby did it all. His technical expertise structured everything from the size of an engine to the precise curvature of a wing.
The 747’s lead engineer, Joe Sutter, called his friend a “very, very good designer.”
Sutter said that job requires “a little bit of art, and a lot of good common sense,” and Mr. Holtby was a master of that balancing act.
Along with Sutter and two other top engineers, Mr. Holtby played a primary role in the design of the world’s first jumbo jet. Named the 747’s vice president and general manager in 1972, he moved on six years later to run the 757 and 767 jetliner projects.
Mike Holtby, his oldest son, credited his father’s leadership success to his sincerity.
“He wasn’t pretentious or arrogant, things that in his position [of authority], he might have been,” said Mike Holtby. “He was very well-liked — not only at Boeing, but everywhere he was.”
Sutter said that not once did he hear the designer raise his voice. Mr. Holtby didn’t need to speak louder to be heard, Sutter said — partly because his engineering expertise spoke for itself, and partly because his introspective nature meant only the most valuable bits of his thoughts were spoken.
Mr. Holtby always “got done what was needed to be done,” said Sutter. “He was quiet — but firm.”
Phil Condit, president of Boeing from 1996 to 2003, has referred to Mr. Holtby as both a mentor and a role model. In “Legend and Legacy,” a history of Boeing by Robert J. Serling, Condit credited Mr. Holtby with articulating some fundamental safety rules for Boeing planes.
In 1997 the 747 team earned the Francois-Xavier Bagnoud Aerospace Prize, a biennial award honoring outstanding aerospace achievement. In 1984, Mr. Holtby, Everette Webb and Condit received the Aircraft Design Award from the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics for their managerial and technical leadership on the 757 and 767.
Upon his retirement, Boeing employees wrote a poetic tribute that read in part, “thanks for your winning ways and your pleasant smile, you’ve been a great leader with that Holtby management style.”
Mr. Holtby continued to coach engineers about the construction of various Boeing jetliners and his design suggestions can be found in many that fly today.
An outdoorsman and a travel enthusiast, he loved to sail on Lake Washington, ski at Stevens Pass and barbecue with his family.
Mr. Holtby’s talent for problem-solving and design translated into all walks of life, son Mike Holtby said. He could quickly refire up his broken-down boat in the middle of Puget Sound, and loved to woodwork in his free time.
Besides son Mike, Mr. Holtby is survived by his wife, Bettie; children Tracy, Jeff, Kris and Matt; nine grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.
Donations can be made to his alma mater, Caltech, or his favorite charities: The Museum of Flight, Doctors Without Borders or the Pacific Science Center.
A small memorial service will be held April 27 on Whidbey Island. Please contact a family member for further details.


seattletimes.com

Boeing trims production of 747-8, cites fewer orders

Boeing cut the production rate on the 747-8 jumbo jet, its biggest and most-expensive model, citing dwindling demand for the largest passenger planes and freighters.

Boeing cut the production rate on the 747-8 jumbo jet, its biggest and most-expensive model, citing dwindling demand for the largest passenger planes and freighters.
Monthly output will drop by early 2014 to 1.75 aircraft from two now, Boeing said Friday. The company said the change in tempo, to 21 jets a year from 24, isn’t expected to have a significant financial impact.
Boeing had previously warned production rates might not be sustainable amid weakness in the global air-cargo market. Four-engine planes such as the 747-8 and the Airbus A380 also have seen their popularity dwindle as airlines opt for the biggest twin-engine models instead.
“The passenger variant’s got five years on the market at most,” said Richard Aboulafia, vice president of Teal Group, an aerospace forecaster that has done work for Boeing. “The market for large quad jets is small, and getting smaller.”
Boeing has won just 110 orders for the 747-8, of which only 40 are for the passenger version, since it began offering the plane in 2005. During that time, carriers ordered more than 700 777s, the company’s largest twin-engine jet. Those models are more fuel-efficient than those with four engines.
The 747-8 is Boeing’s costliest commercial plane, with list prices of $351.4 million for the passenger version and $352 million for the freighter. It entered service in 2011.
Boeing said it will continue to monitor market conditions for jumbo jets and their effect on production rates. The global air-cargo market should resume growing at long-term average rates in 2014, Boeing said.

“If there is no pickup in orders we could see further cuts to the 747-8 production rate,” wrote Rob Stallard, a London-based analyst at RBC Capital Markets.

Twin-engine models like the 787 Dreamliner able to fly longer routes have eroded the need for four-engine planes in serving intercontinental markets. Boeing’s promise to come out with a successor to its best-selling 777, the 777X, also threatens to choke off any potential interest in the 747-8, Teal Group’s Aboulafia said.

Boeing would be smart to postpone any decisions until the cargo market recovers, he said.

“This is the worst time to make a long-term decision about the plane, because for the last two years, we’ve had really bad cargo numbers,” Aboulafia said.

Bloomberg reporter Andrea Rothman in Toulouse, France, contributed to this report.

Boeing teams get to work on putting 787s back into flight

After waiting three months with its 787 Dreamliners grounded across the globe, Boeing wasted little time Friday in starting the modifications that will allow the planes to resume flying.


After waiting three months with its 787 Dreamliners grounded across the globe, Boeing wasted little time Friday in starting the modifications that will allow the planes to resume flying.
Teams of mechanics began making fixes to the 787’s lithium ion battery system as soon as the Federal Aviation Administration formalized its approval Friday afternoon.
United, the sole U.S. 787 operator, could fly one within a week, though the initial flights likely will be without passengers.
A United pilot, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the airline will first fly the planes with passengers on domestic routes out of Houston, but is “very anxious” to start using the 787 between Denver and Tokyo.
So it’s good news for both United and Boeing that the FAA did not alter the Dreamliner’s ETOPS (“extended operations”) certification, which means the 787 keeps its regulatory approval to fly up to three hours away from the nearest airport.
“I’m looking forward to flying it,” the pilot said.
More than 300 specialists will make the battery system modifications, which should take about five days per jet. Boeing said they also will upgrade the 787’s electrical generators and will inspect and if necessary replace power distribution panels that have proved unreliable.
“We’re very excited and happy to be headed down this path now,” said Boeing vice president Mike Sinnett, chief project engineer on the 787, in a conference call with journalists. “It’s been a long haul, that’s for sure.”
The 787 has been grounded since Jan. 16 after two battery overheating incidents. One battery caught fire on an empty jet parked in Boston; another smoldered on a flight in Japan and forced an emergency landing and slide evacuation.
Sinnett declined to speculate on how long it will take airlines to get the 787 back into passenger service, saying only it will be “in the near term.”
The airplanes will be modified in approximately the order they were delivered, which puts the Japanese airlines first in line.
The FAA, having certified the battery re-design, will issue a new Airworthiness Directive early next week mandating its installation to allow passenger service.
But regulators in other countries wil have to follow the FAA’s lead before foreign carriers can fly passengers.
After the new batteries are installed, the logistics of moving airplanes and support needs into place will vary from airline to airline. They also will have different requirements for functional check flights and pilot refresher training, and will need time to reschedule flights and sell tickets on routes that have been suspended.
The worldwide fleet of 50 in-service Dreamliners is unlikely to resume all planned 787 passenger routes worldwide before June.
The unprecedented setback of the grounding will cost Boeing more than $600 million just to pay for the labor and parts in developing, testing, certifying and retrofitting the fix, according to one Wall Street analyst’s estimate.
Beyond that, it will undoubtedly owe compensation to airlines for lost revenue. That can’t be reliably estimated because some customers will take price breaks on future orders instead of cash.
Boeing executives, understandably, were jubilant at the FAA’s clearance to fly.
CEO Jim McNerney said “the promise of the 787 and the benefits it provides to airlines and their passengers remain fully intact.”
The redesigned battery “made a great airplane even better,” said Boeing Commercial Airplanes CEO Ray Conner.
Federal regulators, led by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, insisted that their decision to give the Dreamliner the green light to fly again doesn’t weaken their committment to safety.
FAA Administrator Michael Huerta said he approved the fix only after “a team of FAA certification specialists observed rigorous tests ... and devoted weeks to reviewing detailed analysis of the design changes.”
Sinnett said Boeing spent a total of 200,000 engineering hours developing its solution and 100,000 hours testing it.
The modifications include a steel containment box around the battery and a titanium tube connecting the box to the fuselage skin. If the battery overheats, the tube will suck out any gases, including oxygen, from the box.
This “completely prevents any possibility of fire,” Sinnett said. Indeed, he said the enclosure and venting system is designed to be so safe that “a worst-case battery failure doesn’t even require the airplane to divert.”
Engineers also added electrical and thermal insulation around the eight cells of the battery to minimize short circuits and prevent any overheating from spreading cell to cell.
Sinnett provided details from Boeing’s lab tests that he said demonstrate the efficacy of the internal battery design changes.
When Boeing forced a cell failure by using a heating element to cook a cell inside the original battery design, the temperature hit 300 degrees Celsius for half an hour after the first cell ruptured and vented gas, and caused all the other cells to overheat and vent.
On the new battery design the same test yielded a very brief peak temperature of less than 150 degrees C, and only two cells overheated enough to vent.
Two fresh aspects of Friday’s 787 announcements provide good news for airlines.
First, the FAA’s decision not to reduce the 787’s ETOPS certication will come as a relief, after the head of the agency, Huerta, told a Senate hearing Tuesday that this approval was under review.
Maintaining the three-hour allowed flight time away from the nearest airport is crucial to the jet’s use for flying long routes over the ocean or the poles, a key feature for airlines.
Second, Boeing’s decision to take the opportunity to replace or upgrade other electrical 787 components may improve reliability, particularly of the power panels.
Last December, a United 787 had to divert after a power panel short circuit caused a generator to go offline. That was one of at least four such inflight failures last year, which Boeing later blamed on bad circuit boards in the power panels.
In addition to replacing those, if necessary, Sinnett said the battery teams will check that each plane’s six electric generators are “up to the latest standard.”
U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Everett, welcomed the 787’s clearance, while cautioning that the battery failures in January demand more investigation.
He said that during a late March briefing by the company on the battery fix, “I was impressed with the ingenuity the Boeing engineers put into this.”
However, “once the fixes are done and these planes are back up and flying, Congress needs to go back and look at the certification process and figure out how did we ever get to this place,” said Larsen, the ranking Democrat on the House Aviation Subcommittee.
That scrutiny is set to begin Tuesday when the National Transportation Safety Board opens two days of hearings into the original design and certification of the 787 batteries.
Witnesses scheduled to appear include Boeing’s Sinnett and some of his technical staff, as well as top FAA certification personnel and managers from battery system supplier Thales of France and battery-maker GS Yuasa of Japan.
Friday, Sinnett said that Boeing will closely analyze what went wrong on the 787 battery design and learn from it for the future.
“There will be some very significant attention given to this and what we have to learn from it,” Sinnett said.


seattletimes.com

Repairs begin to batteries on grounded 787s

Boeing has begun repairs on the 787 Dreamliner to fix a battery fault that grounded the fleet for three months as it enters talks with airlines to resume deliveries and meet a full-year production target.

Boeing has begun repairs on the 787 Dreamliner to fix a battery fault that grounded the fleet for three months as it enters talks with airlines to resume deliveries and meet a full-year production target.
ANA, the biggest 787 operator, started repairs Monday morning at four airports around Japan, said spokesman Ryosei Nomura. Japan Airlines has also started fixing the batteries, according to a person familiar with the plan, who declined to be identified as the information isn’t public.
The global fleet of 50 Dreamliners was grounded worldwide Jan. 16 after lithium-ion batteries on two separate planes overheated and melted, causing flights to be canceled and cutting revenue to the operators. Boeing has dispatched about 300 personnel on 10 teams to airlines to install the fix over five days while preparing the handover of new 787s.
“We are starting to have detailed conversations with all of our customers about delivery timing,” Larry Loftis, Boeing 787 vice president and general manager, told journalists in London. “We don’t have specific dates right now.”
Deliveries will resume “within weeks,” Loftis said. Production of 787s, which had reached five aircraft per month when the fleet was grounded in January, is now reaching seven. Loftis said there are no reasons that 2013 production targets will not be met, including an output level of 10 787s per month.
The cost of the modification is “fairly small,” Loftis said, while declining to specify what the total cost of the grounding will be. Boeing, the world’s largest aircraft maker, reports first-quarter earnings on Wednesday.
ANA and JAL, which operate 22 787s between them, are waiting for approval from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and Japan’s Civil Aviation Bureau before they can restart flights. ANA expects to complete repairs on its 787s next month.
“Pilots will be able to fly the planes soon after studying the changes to the manual,” said Toshikazu Nagasawa, a director at the Air Line Pilots Association of Japan, which has about 4,500 members.
“The biggest problem will be getting passengers to fly on the planes.”
The airlines received service bulletins on repairs from Boeing after it last week won approval from the FAA for the 787’s redesigned battery system.
The FAA said it will issue a directive this week to let flights resume once the battery fixes are made.
Both airlines still need permission from Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism before they can fly the planes.
The ministry’s Civil Aviation Bureau is in its final stages of the Dreamliner probe, Shigeru Takano, the agency’s director in charge of air-transport safety, said last week in Tokyo.
Japan will wait until after a two-day U.S. National Transportation Safety Board hearing on the JAL 787 battery fire starting Tuesday before making a decision on the resumption of flights, Takano said.
Boeing engineers will arrive in India on Wednesday, after the work in Japan, to apply the fix for Air India’s six 787s. The airline expects to resume 787 services by May 15 at the latest, Rohit Nandan, the company’s chairman, said today in New Delhi.
United, the only U.S. carrier with Dreamliners, called the FAA’s move a “good step forward.”
The airline is selling seats for Dreamliner flights starting May 31 for domestic routes including Houston-Denver, and is targeting June 10 to begin new service between Denver and Tokyo.
 

 

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Japan lands again in aviation with new jet

In late 2013,Mitsubishi Aircraft plans the first flight of its Mitsubishi Regional Jet, a sleek, 90-seat commercial plane that is Japan’s bid to break into the aircraft industry’s big leagues after almost 70 years.

TOKYO — As a small boy, Teruaki Kawai watched wide-eyed as American DC-3s took off and landed at a small airport across an inlet from his home on the Hiroshima coast.
Japan’s golden era of aviation, which culminated with the feared and respected Mitsubishi Zero fighter planes, had ended a decade earlier along with World War II.
Banned from making planes by American occupiers after the war, then allowed only to make parts for U.S. military jets, Japan’s aircraft industry was a shadow of its former self.
If all goes well this year, Kawai, now 65 and president of Mitsubishi Aircraft, will preside over Japan’s biggest aviation comeback since the war. In late 2013, the company plans the first flight of its Mitsubishi Regional Jet, a sleek, 90-seat commercial plane that is Japan’s bid to break into the industry’s big leagues after almost 70 years.
“For decades, we were confined to supplying parts for other passenger jets. But we’re finally heading into new territory,” Kawai said in a recent interview at Mitsubishi Aircraft’s Tokyo office.
Mitsubishi’s comeback was abetted in large part by Boeing’s outsourcing more of its aircraft manufacture to overseas suppliers. As Boeing came to rely on foreign contractors, Japanese manufacturers moved in, designing and supplying some of the jet’s most vital sections.
A full third of Boeing’s new 787 Dreamliner is supplied by Japanese manufacturers, including Mitsubishi Aircraft’s company, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, which makes the jet’s carbon-fiber composite main wings.
Even so, Boeing and Mitsubishi could not be further apart in their approach to jet-building. In contrast to the cutting-edge 787, Mitsubishi’s regional jet uses only a little of the advanced carbon fiber that its parent company supplies to Boeing.
Neither does the regional jet use the volatile lithium-ion batteries that have become a major headache for Boeing, overheating on two planes in January and prompting American and Japanese safety regulators to ground the entire 787 fleet. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration on Friday approved Boeing’s fix for the battery system.
Mitsubishi’s caution underscores the importance, to the company and to Japan, of getting the regional jet project off the ground in an industry where reputation for reliability is paramount. That is especially the case, experts say, for a country long absent from the business of making planes, save military jets under license from the United States, and a series of small private jets.
In the late 1950s and 1960s, Mitsubishi participated in a consortium to develop the YS-11 plane, a 60-seat turboprop airliner led and largely financed by the Japanese government, which was eager to restart the country’s aviation industry.
Leading the YS-11’s design was Teruo Tojo, one of the Mitsubishi Zero fighter’s original engineers and the second son of Hideki Tojo, the Japanese wartime leader who was executed as a war criminal by the Allies.
But with no experience in making civilian jets, Tojo and his team of engineers struggled with the YS-11’s design.
Burned by the YS-11 flop, Japan shifted its aviation strategy to supplying, and learning from, the largest aircraft makers of the time, of which the largest was Boeing. Japanese suppliers have played an increasingly bigger role in building Boeing aircraft, supplying 15 percent of the 767 jet, 21 percent of the 777 and 35 percent of the 787.
The Japanese government quickly became one of the largest financial backers of those projects, handing out billions of yen in subsidies to help Japanese suppliers develop technology and win lucrative contracts from Boeing. T
Though the government declines to reveal exact numbers, estimates by researchers at the State University of New York of how much Japan has handed out to 787 suppliers in subsidies and loans over the past decade are as high as $1.6 billion.
Boeing outsources its parts manufacturing to pare its investment in research and development, design, manufacturing and also its workforce. These Boeing contracts have kept tens of thousands of Japanese workers busy for years, and still account for about 40 percent of jobs in the industry. They also help keep Japanese companies on the forefront of crucial aeronautical technology.
And in a cozy quid pro quo, Japan’s biggest airlines have for years bought their planes almost exclusively from Boeing — an unusual practice among global carriers, which tend to play Boeing off rival Airbus to negotiate better terms and prices.
In 2003, Japan announced bold plans to finance the development of compact, fuel-efficient aircraft. By the mid-2000s, Mitsubishi executives were gearing up to develop a passenger jet. The company placed Mitsubishi Aircraft’s new headquarters in its prewar offices in Nagoya, where engineers designed the Zero.
The Mitsubishi Regional Jet, announced in 2008, is conservative in its use of new technologies and materials.
Fuel-saving engines
Still, Mitsubishi’s regional jet boasts about 20 percent in fuel savings compared with similar size Brazilian-built Embraer 190 jets. Much of the fuel economy comes from its use of new engines from Pratt & Whitney.
The plane’s wings are thinner and are more aerodynamic than those on similar models, also improving energy efficiency.
Mitsubishi says newly designed seats on the MRJ also offer wider seats than rival aircraft: 18.5 inches across compared with 17.3 inches on Canada’s Bombardier’s CRJ700 series.
The company has 165 firm orders for the $42 million jet, and it aims to secure as many as 5,000 orders over the next two decades — a goal some experts dismiss as unrealistic.
It faces well-established rivals like Bombardier and Embraer. The Russians and Chinese are also making inroads into plane-building.
By bolstering its aviation credentials, Japan could also keep upstarts in South Korea, Taiwan and China from encroaching on its lucrative Boeing work, which analysts say contributes around a fifth of Mitsubishi’s roughly $5.7 billion aeronautics business.
“As a boy, I didn’t think that Japan would build a plane again,” Kawai said. “But it’s been over a half-century. It’s high time for Japan to give it another go.”
 

 

 

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S.C. governor signs Boeing incentives bill

South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley on Tuesday signed legislation to provide $120 million in incentives to the Boeing Co. for its expansion plans in the state.

COLUMBIA, S.C. —
South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley on Tuesday signed legislation to provide $120 million in incentives to the Boeing Co. for its expansion plans in the state.
"Boeing is a part of the fabric of South Carolina, and this solidifies our relationship with Boeing going forward," Haley spokesman Rob Godfrey said.
The measure moved quickly through the Legislature after Chicago-based Boeing announced two weeks ago it would invest another $1 billion and create 2,000 jobs over eight years in North Charleston.
The state House gave final approval to the measure on Thursday. Lawmakers say Boeing's plans will put South Carolina in a position to become an aerospace hub, with suppliers locating across the state for not only Boeing but also possibly Airbus in Alabama.
The borrowing bill covers Boeing's upfront costs of buying and improving the land.
Commerce Secretary Bobby Hitt, a former BMW executive, has said the incentives are similar to those granted to BMW when its plant in Greer expanded after opening in the 1990s. BMW suppliers are located in 41 of the state's 46 counties.
The first of Boeing's 787 Dreamliners built in South Carolina rolled off the assembly line about a year ago. The plant assembles one of the planes a month and within weeks will be assembling two a month, says Jack Jones, the vice president and general manager of Boeing South Carolina.
The Boeing plant also builds mid- and aft-body assemblies for 787s that are made in South Carolina and Everett, Wash. Jones said seven assemblies are put together each month and the number will increase to 10 this fall.
House Speaker Bobby Harrell said he believes Boeing will deliver more than the minimum promised for the $120 million.
In 2009, lawmakers gave Boeing an incentive package worth $170 million in exchange for the company spending at least $750 million and creating at least 3,800 jobs within seven years. The North Charleston complex already employs about 6,000 people.
"Boeing is a company that's under-promised and over-delivered," said Harrell, R-Charleston. "The result of cementing them to us is well beyond what these numbers show here."
Of the 2,000 new jobs, half of those hired will be in engineering, computer technology, and research and development, according to Harrell and Senate Finance Chairman Hugh Leatherman, who helped negotiate the incentives package.
The 787 has been grounded since mid-January because of a problem with smoldering lithium-ion batteries. Boeing has since developed and tested a revamped version of the battery system, with changes designed to prevent a fire or to contain one should it occur. FAA officials approved the revamped batteries last week and agreed to lift the grounding order.
None of the 787s that reported battery problems were built in South Carolina.
Airbus broke ground earlier this month on its first U.S. airplane assembly. Its $600 million factory in Alabama is expected to employ 1,000 people once production of the Airbus A320 jet begins around 2015.
Boeing's 2009 decision resulted in a lawsuit by the National Labor Relations Board, which alleged in April 2011 that Boeing was building a plant in South Carolina, a right-to-work state, over concerns about strikes by union workers in the state of Washington.
The complaint, which sought a court order forcing the aerospace company to build the line in the Pacific Northwest, prompted outrage from Republican lawmakers, South Carolina officials and business groups, and became a major political issue in the GOP presidential primary.
The NLRB officially dropped its high-profile case eight months later after the Machinists union in Washington approved a 4-year contract extension with Boeing and agreed to withdraw its charge that the company violated federal labor laws. Under the deal, Boeing promised to build the new version of its 737 airplane in Washington state.
Last month, Boeing announced plans to lay off about 800 workers in Washington by year's end.


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Boeing: Tests of 787 battery should have been tougher

At Tuesday’s hearing by the National Transportation Safety Board into the 787 Dreamliner battery design, Boeing conceded that its certification testing fell short and needs to be tightened in the future.

At an investigative hearing into the 787 Dreamliner battery’s design Tuesday, Boeing conceded its certification testing fell short and needs to be tightened in the future.
“In retrospect, we don’t believe it was conservative enough,” said Mike Sinnett, Boeing’s chief project engineer on the 787.
National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chairwoman Deborah Hersman asked how a lithium-ion- battery failure, which wasn’t supposed to happen more than once in 10 million flight hours, could happen twice in just over 50,000 flight hours.
The testimony that came closest to an answer was that a test Boeing used to simulate an internal short circuit — by piercing a battery cell with a nail — failed to replicate the real-world outcome.
Sinnett said the nail test convinced engineers an internal short would cause overheating of a single cell but would not spread to other cells.
Hersman, in a phone interview after the hearing, said Boeing’s “assumptions and the testing were not as conservative as they could have been.”
In January, two apparent internal short circuits inside 787 batteries — one that caught fire in an empty plane on the ground in Boston and another that smoldered in flight in Japan — caused multiple cells to overheat.
Sinnett said Boeing in the future “may apply tighter test criteria ... in areas of new technology.”
Still, he offered a stout defense of the overall battery design and testing process.
After an unprecedented three-month grounding of the new aircraft, the Federal Aviation Administration on Friday gave Boeing the go-ahead to install a revamped battery system in the 50 planes it has already delivered to customers.
Testimony on Tuesday, the first day of the two-day hearing, revealed Boeing made two major revisions to its design after battery-testing incidents prior to certification.
A serious fire that burned down a Tucson, Ariz., building owned by the maker of the 787 battery charger, Securaplane Technologies, prompted one set of improvements to prevent overcharging.
And a previously unpublicized 2009 incident, when a battery cell overheated in a test lab in Rockford, Ill., brought more design changes to protect against over-discharging.
Sinnett said the one-in-10-million-flight-hours calculation factored in the battery cell manufacturing, screening and quality-control processes, but did not include other possibilities, such as abuse of the batteries or installation of a battery that doesn’t meet specifications.
He conceded that in the two overheating incidents in January, there was no evidence the batteries were abused or didn’t meet spec. The root cause of the incidents remains unknown.
Sinnett said it’s “too early to tell” if they were due to errors in the design or in the manufacture of the batteries.
He reiterated his conviction that “lithium-ion batteries are the right choice for the 787,” adding that — even without the latest battery fix — the 787 design includes protections if a battery fails.
In the in-flight incident in Japan, for example, when smoke was detected the air-conditioning system adjusted and vented the smoke out of the airplane.
“The overall system worked,” said Sinnett. “We didn’t have a catastrophic outcome. ... The layers of protection performed their function.”
In the course of developing its fix for the battery system over the past three months, Boeing devised a new test — applying a heating element to one cell — that has replicated the propagation of overheating from cell to cell.
“It’s probably something we would use in the future as a standard,” Boeing systems engineer Jerry Hulm testified.
FAA representatives were also quizzed closely at the hearing about their original certification of the 787 battery system.
Ali Bahrami, head of the FAA’s Renton-based transport airplane directorate, said regulators were always aware of the risks from lithium ion batteries.
“We did the best we could under the circumstances, and the knowledge that existed, to come up with the standards” that Boeing’s battery had to meet, he said.
Dorenda Baker, director of the FAA’s aircraft certification service, emphasized that on a routine flight “these lithium batteries are not critical” to the jet’s safety.
“If a battery stops working in and of itself, it does not have much effect on the normal operation of the airplane,” she said.
And Steve Boyd, manager of the FAA airplane and flight-crew interface branch, defended the way the agency lets Boeing run all the testing needed for certification.
“The FAA as a matter of practice does not do its own technical evaluations,” he said. “Instead, we work closely with the manufacturers, reviewing the work that they have done. “
“Our own internal specialists ... serve as an independent set of eyes on the manufacturer’s analyses and test plans,” Boyd said.
Also giving testimony Tuesday, all under oath, were representatives of Boeing’s battery system suppliers: Thales of France, the battery system integrator; and GS Yuasa of Japan, which manufactures the batteries.
Boeing’s Sinnett backed both suppliers to the hilt, saying that they were selected “through a very rigorous process” that included assessments of the “performance, history and capabilities” of each.


seattletimes.com

Boeing: Tests of 787 battery should have been tougher

At Tuesday’s hearing by the National Transportation Safety Board into the 787 Dreamliner battery design, Boeing conceded that its certification testing fell short and needs to be tightened in the future.

At an investigative hearing into the 787 Dreamliner battery’s design Tuesday, Boeing conceded its certification testing fell short and needs to be tightened in the future.
“In retrospect, we don’t believe it was conservative enough,” said Mike Sinnett, Boeing’s chief project engineer on the 787.
National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chairwoman Deborah Hersman asked how a lithium-ion- battery failure, which wasn’t supposed to happen more than once in 10 million flight hours, could happen twice in just over 50,000 flight hours.
The testimony that came closest to an answer was that a test Boeing used to simulate an internal short circuit — by piercing a battery cell with a nail — failed to replicate the real-world outcome.
Sinnett said the nail test convinced engineers an internal short would cause overheating of a single cell but would not spread to other cells.
Hersman, in a phone interview after the hearing, said Boeing’s “assumptions and the testing were not as conservative as they could have been.”
In January, two apparent internal short circuits inside 787 batteries — one that caught fire in an empty plane on the ground in Boston and another that smoldered in flight in Japan — caused multiple cells to overheat.
Sinnett said Boeing in the future “may apply tighter test criteria ... in areas of new technology.”
Still, he offered a stout defense of the overall battery design and testing process.
After an unprecedented three-month grounding of the new aircraft, the Federal Aviation Administration on Friday gave Boeing the go-ahead to install a revamped battery system in the 50 planes it has already delivered to customers.
Testimony on Tuesday, the first day of the two-day hearing, revealed Boeing made two major revisions to its design after battery-testing incidents prior to certification.
A serious fire that burned down a Tucson, Ariz., building owned by the maker of the 787 battery charger, Securaplane Technologies, prompted one set of improvements to prevent overcharging.
And a previously unpublicized 2009 incident, when a battery cell overheated in a test lab in Rockford, Ill., brought more design changes to protect against over-discharging.
Sinnett said the one-in-10-million-flight-hours calculation factored in the battery cell manufacturing, screening and quality-control processes, but did not include other possibilities, such as abuse of the batteries or installation of a battery that doesn’t meet specifications.
He conceded that in the two overheating incidents in January, there was no evidence the batteries were abused or didn’t meet spec. The root cause of the incidents remains unknown.
Sinnett said it’s “too early to tell” if they were due to errors in the design or in the manufacture of the batteries.
He reiterated his conviction that “lithium-ion batteries are the right choice for the 787,” adding that — even without the latest battery fix — the 787 design includes protections if a battery fails.
In the in-flight incident in Japan, for example, when smoke was detected the air-conditioning system adjusted and vented the smoke out of the airplane.
“The overall system worked,” said Sinnett. “We didn’t have a catastrophic outcome. ... The layers of protection performed their function.”
In the course of developing its fix for the battery system over the past three months, Boeing devised a new test — applying a heating element to one cell — that has replicated the propagation of overheating from cell to cell.
“It’s probably something we would use in the future as a standard,” Boeing systems engineer Jerry Hulm testified.
FAA representatives were also quizzed closely at the hearing about their original certification of the 787 battery system.
Ali Bahrami, head of the FAA’s Renton-based transport airplane directorate, said regulators were always aware of the risks from lithium ion batteries.
“We did the best we could under the circumstances, and the knowledge that existed, to come up with the standards” that Boeing’s battery had to meet, he said.
Dorenda Baker, director of the FAA’s aircraft certification service, emphasized that on a routine flight “these lithium batteries are not critical” to the jet’s safety.
“If a battery stops working in and of itself, it does not have much effect on the normal operation of the airplane,” she said.
And Steve Boyd, manager of the FAA airplane and flight-crew interface branch, defended the way the agency lets Boeing run all the testing needed for certification.
“The FAA as a matter of practice does not do its own technical evaluations,” he said. “Instead, we work closely with the manufacturers, reviewing the work that they have done. “
“Our own internal specialists ... serve as an independent set of eyes on the manufacturer’s analyses and test plans,” Boyd said.
Also giving testimony Tuesday, all under oath, were representatives of Boeing’s battery system suppliers: Thales of France, the battery system integrator; and GS Yuasa of Japan, which manufactures the batteries.
Boeing’s Sinnett backed both suppliers to the hilt, saying that they were selected “through a very rigorous process” that included assessments of the “performance, history and capabilities” of each.


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