Over the holiday weekend, All Nippon Airways (ANA) and Boeing started readiness validation tests for the 787 Dreamliner in Japan to prepare the aircraft for its delivery to ANA sometime in August to September. The second Dreamliner made (ZA002 — which will not be the first delivered) flew over to Japan from Seattle to start the week-long testing while flying throughout Japan.
“ANA is proud to be the first airline in the world that will operate the 787,” said Shinichiro Ito, ANA president and CEO. “Validating all of our training and preparations for the Dreamliner is critical to help ensure a smoother entry into service for our passengers and crews later this year.”
Before ground crews in Japan had the opportunity to experience the 787 Dreamliner, many have previosly been flown to Everett, WA to get practice working on the all new aircraft. On July 2nd, ZA002 left Boeing Field early in the morning heading for the first time to Japan. Although the 787 has flown many times previously, this flight was different — it was meant to simulate normal operations.
Even though the 787 Dreamliner will be operating as it is carrying passengers, the interior is very different than what you will find after it is prepared for for delivery. There are a few standard passenger seats, but also many work stations and none of the creature comforts you can expect when the first Dreamliner is delivered.
After an uneventful flight, the 787 landed at Tokyo’s Haneda airport at 6:21am on July 3rd, local time, to a cheering crowd of over 1000 people. The 787 Dreamliner will continue to fly and conduct tests for maintenance, servicing and flight crew at five airports in Tokyo: Osaka (Itami and Kansai), Okayama and Hiroshima. ANA’s first scheduled service with the 787 will be either the Haneda-Okayama or Haneda-Hiroshima route when deliveries begin later this year.
You can follow the Boeing 787 Dreamliner while in Japan on Boeing’s social media: Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. A tip-of-the-hat to Boeing for following this historical event. They could just send out interesting, but bland press releases about the progress, but it is awesome they continue to share so much of the 787 Dreamliner’s experience via social media.
LOT's new livery to debut on the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. Photo courtesy of Boeing and LOT. Click for larger.
LOT Polish Airlines currently has eight Boeing 787 Dreamliners on order and during the Paris Air Show they unveiled an updated livery that will debut on the Dreamliner. The large “LOT” lettering and bird will remain, but with many other updated airline liveries, the cheat line running down the windows will disappear. The aircraft will be configured with 18 business class, 21 premium economy class and 213 economy class seats. LOT is set to be the first European airline to receive the 787 Dreamliner, starting in summer of 2012.
The new livery is cleaner than their current one and it is great they are keeping the large “LOT” at the front making the airline easily recognizable. The color red is a new addition to the livery and matches the red found on the Polish flag. I think I can say I actually like the new livery quite a LOT (heh).
ANA showed off their special Dreamliner Livery today. Photo by Boeing.
Today, All Nippon Airways (ANA) unveiled their special Boeing 787 Dreamliner livery.
The livery is the celebrate that ANA will be the first airline in the world to fly the 787 Dreamliner. The blue lines at the rear of the fuselage are designed to highlight how the three core elements of the airline’s service brand – innovation, uniqueness and the inspiration of modern Japan ’“ operate across the ANA network. Only two Dreamliners will be painted in the special livery, the rest will be in standard ANA livery.
ANA's new Business Class will have staggered seating. Click for bigger.
ANA also unveiled their new cabin layout that will premier on the 787 Dreamliner. Business Class seats will have full lay flat beds, 17″ monitors and staggered seating, allowing aisle access from every seat. For both long and short haul layouts in the 787 Dreamliner, there will be two classes: Business and Economy.
Economy class will feature seats that have fixed backs, where a passenger can recline, but it will not impede into the person’s space behind you. Every seat will have in seat entertainment and universal power and USB ports.
ANA has ordered 55 787 Dreamliners and the first should be delivered sometime in August or September.
Boeing has been busy this week releasing one important press release after another. I am a little behind still, so I decided to put them all in one easy to follow blog to keep everyone updated:
BOEING OPENS NEW SOUTH CAROLINA 787 FINAL ASSEMBLY BUILDING Boeing has officially opened the second location where the Boeing 787 Dreamliner will be built – North Charleston South Carolina. Although the 787 is a bit behind schedule, the new facility was completed six months ahead of its origional schedule. The final assembly of the first South Carolina-built 787 Dreamliner will begin later this summer. Once up and running, the facility is expected to produce three 787 Dreamliners per month.
The new Final Assembly building encompasses 642,720 square feet and used one million cubic feet of concrete. Compare that to the Boeing Factory in Everett, WA being 4,299,967 square feet.
BOEING STARTS SHARING ON FLICKR If you read the blog, you know I have loved following Boeing through their social media exploration. Not too long ago, they started a YouTube account adn now they have started Flickr — be sure to follow.
BOEING 747-8F FLYING TO PARIS ON BIOFUEL This will be the first time that an airliner has flown across the Atlantic Ocean using BioFuel. Boeing pilots Capt. Keith Otsuka and Capt. Rick Braun and Cargolux Capt. Sten Rossby will fly the airplane with each of the 747-8 Freighter’s four GE GEnx-2B engines powered by a blend of 15 percent camelina-based biofuel mixed with 85 percent traditional kerosene fuel (Jet-A).
BOEING EXPECTS DEMAND FOR 33,500 NEW PLANES OVER NEXT 20 YEARS That is a lot of moola — about $4trillion to be exact. Boeing forcasts that the world fleet will double by 2030 and obviously want to get in on the action. Boeing is concentrating on growth in China and India with most new aircraft deliveries taking place in Asian Pacific countries.
This Boeing 787 Dreamliner is supposed to be the sixth 787 that Air India is supposed to take delivery of.
Air India is going through some pretty difficult times and many are questioning their future. Heather Timmons with the New York Times recently shared a story on how a new Air India employee made a horrific discovery on one of their flights that clearly highlights the airline’s current lack of oversight.
The new pilot made a visit to the cockpit during a flight and discovered both pilots had covered the windows with newspaper to block out the sun — an obvious violation.
This is only one of many complaints the state-run airline has received recently and passengers are noticing. The airline used to be the primary airline in India, but has since been surpassed by Kingfisher, IndiGo and Jet Airways since India’s airline industry was deregulated almost 20 years go.
During the last fiscal year, Air India lost about $1 billion in taxpayer money. Currently, there is a solid movement for the Indian government to remove themselves from the airline business.
Even with the outside pressure, both a spokes person for Air India and India’s new civil aviation minister, Vayalar Ravi, have stated the airline will not shut down and will remain under governmental control.
Ravi has admitted that there has been poor management in the past and that the airline has bought too many planes. Air India changed many of their wide-bodied orders into single-aisle orders in 2006 and today there is talk that Air India might have to defer the delivery of their Boeing 787 Dreamliners due to their continuing financial crisis.
It seems the management of Air India needs to wake up. Obviously, the current plan is not working and the airline has already lost many of their customers. It takes much more money and effort to convince alienated customers to come back than it does to attract new ones. With strong competition from other airlines, Air India will need to make serious changes to survive.
