| To: Jeff Vayda who wrote (3596) | 1/7/2024 1:11:04 PM | | From: John Koligman | | | | | So you are saying the plane most likely was not built correctly? Missing attachment hardware sounds like dangerous and sloppy build work. As to crashing, I was thinking about what if this happened at 35 thousand feet and cruising speed. Could it have taken out a bunch more 'metal'? Who knows. I do remember that Hawaii flight, which was incredible when you actually saw pictures of the missing structure. It was great that nobody was actually sitting in the seat next to the damage. If they were it could have been an 'Auric Goldfinger' situation. |
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| From: John Koligman | 1/7/2024 1:20:27 PM | | | | | | I noticed Spirit AeroSystems also seems to get mentioned quite often in all these problem scenarios.
Boeing Again Under Scrutiny After Latest 737 Max Problem
A sudden hole appearing in the side of an Alaska Airlines plane midflight follows years of problems with the manufacturer’s aircraft.
A 737 Max plane being built at the Boeing factory in Renton, Wash., in 2019. Credit...Lindsey Wasson/Reuters
By Niraj Chokshi
Jan. 7, 2024Updated 10:04 a.m. ET
A harrowing flight over the weekend is again forcing Boeing to confront concerns over its planes, particularly the 737 Max, already one of the most scrutinized jets in history.
No one was seriously injured in the episode on an Alaska Airlines flight Friday night in which a portion of a 737 Max 9 fuselage blew out in midair, exposing passengers to howling wind. The plane landed safely, but the event, on a flight from Portland, Ore., to Ontario, Calif., has spooked travelers and prompted immediate safety inspections on similar planes.
Federal authorities focused attention on a mid-cabin door plug, which is used to fill the space where an emergency exit would be placed if the plane were configured with more seats.
The Federal Aviation Administration ordered the inspection of 171 Max 9 planes operated by Alaska and other U.S. airlines, causing dozens of flight cancellations on Saturday. It said the inspections should take four to eight hours per plane to complete.
“We agree with and fully support the F.A.A.’s decision to require immediate inspections of 737-9 airplanes with the same configuration as the affected airplane,” Jessica Kowal, a Boeing spokeswoman, said Saturday.
It is not clear whether Boeing is to blame for what happened, but the episode raises new questions for the manufacturer. Another version of the Max, a 737 Max 8, was involved in two crashes that killed hundreds of people in 2018 and 2019 and led to a worldwide grounding of that plane.
Air Safety in the United States
“The issue is what’s going on at Boeing,” said John Goglia, a longtime aviation safety consultant and a retired member of the National Transportation Safety Board, which investigates airplane crashes.
Last month, the company urged airlines to inspect the more than 1,300 delivered Max planes for a possible loose bolt in the rudder-control system. Over the summer, Boeing said a key supplier had improperly drilled holes in a component that helps to maintain cabin pressure. Since then, Boeing has invested in and worked more closely with that supplier, Spirit AeroSystems, to address production problems.
“We are seeing increased stability and quality performance within our own factories, but we’re working to get the supply chain caught up to the same standards,” Boeing’s chief executive, Dave Calhoun, said on a call with investor analysts and reporters in October.
Spirit AeroSystems also worked on the fuselage for the 737 Max 9, including manufacturing and installing the door plug that failed on the Alaska Airlines flight.
Deliveries of another Boeing plane, the twin-aisle 787 Dreamliner, were virtually stalled for more than a year, until the summer of 2022, while the aircraft maker worked with the F.A.A. to address various quality concerns, including paper-thin gaps in the plane’s body.
Another flaw discovered last summer slowed deliveries of the plane again. And production of both the 737 and 787 has been slow to speed up amid those and other problems with quality and the supply chain.
The Max was grounded in early 2019 after two crashes killed a total of 346 people in Indonesia and Ethiopia. Over 20 months, Boeing worked with regulators around the world to fix problems with the plane’s flight control software and other components.
By the time passenger flights aboard the Max resumed in late 2020, the crisis had cost the company about $20 billion.
The two midsize variants of the plane, the Max 8 and Max 9, have been flying since then. But the smallest, the Max 7, and the largest, the Max 10, have yet to be approved by regulators.
The Max is the best-selling plane in Boeing’s history. The more than 4,500 outstanding orders for the plane account for more than 76 percent of Boeing’s order book. The plane is also popular among airlines: Of the nearly three million flights scheduled globally this month, about 5 percent are planned to be carried out using a Max, mostly the Max 8, according to Cirium, an aviation data provider.
Alaska Airlines has 65 Max 9 planes, while United Airlines has 79. Both were conducting inspections on Saturday.
On Sunday, Turkish Airlines announced that it would immediately ground the five Max 9 planes in its fleet until further notice.
Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board have started looking into the case and are expected to examine a wide range of factors, including Boeing’s manufacturing process and the F.A.A.’s oversight of the company and any work Boeing or Alaska Airlines carried out on the plane. Investigators have also identified an area where the door probably landed and asked for help from the public in finding it.
“This is the kind of thing where, until you really get into the investigation — you identify all the facts, conditions and circumstances of this particular event — do you determine whether this is just a one-off or a systemic problem,” said Greg Feith, an aviation security expert and former N.T.S.B. investigator.
In the meantime, those who make, service, operate and regulate the planes will all be in the spotlight.
“Every American deserves a full explanation from Boeing and the F.A.A. on what’s gone wrong and on the steps that are being taken to ensure another incident does not occur in the future,” Senator J.D. Vance, Republican of Ohio, said in a post on Saturday on X.
Mark Walker and Safak Timur contributed reporting.
Niraj Chokshi writes about aviation, rail and other transportation industries. More about Niraj Chokshi |
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| From: John Koligman | 1/8/2024 4:05:57 PM | | | | | | United Airlines inspections find loose bolts on several Boeing 737 Max 9 aircraft after grounding
PUBLISHED MON, JAN 8 20243:51 PM ESTUPDATED 7 MIN AGO
Leslie Josephs @LESLIEJOSEPHS
A United Airlines Boeing 737 Max 9 aircraft lands at San Francisco International Airport on March 13, 2019 in Burlingame, California.
Justin Sullivan | Getty Images
United Airlines has found loose bolts on door plugs of several Boeing 737 Max 9 planes during inspections spurred when a panel of that type blew off an Alaska Airlines flight last week, according to a person familiar with the matter.
United didn’t immediately comment.
The Federal Aviation Administration on Saturday grounded dozens of 737 Max 9s after the panel blew out midflight on Alaska Flight 1282.
Plane manufacturer Boeing said earlier Monday it issued instructions to airlines to conduct the inspections of the Max 9s in their fleets.
Alaska Airlines, which is also inspecting its planes, didn’t immediately comment. Aviation publication The Air Current earlier reported that United had discovered the loose bolts.
This is breaking news. Check back for updates. |
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| From: roto | 1/11/2024 7:47:20 PM | | | | | | Airbus lands record orders in 2023, beats Boeing on deliveries
 Stock Markets
investing.com
Published Jan 11, 2024 11:49AM ET Updated Jan 11, 2024 01:56PM ET
© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Logos of Airbus are seen at the Milipol Paris, the worldwide exhibition
dedicated to homeland security and safety, in Villepinte near Paris, France, November 15, 2023.
REUTERS/Sarah Meyssonnier/File Photo
BA
-2.27%
By Joanna Plucinska, Dagmarah Mackos and Tim Hepher
(Reuters) -
Airbus reported record annual jet orders and confirmed an 11% rise in 2023 deliveries on Thursday, maintaining the top manufacturing spot against rival Boeing (NYSE: BA) for a fifth year.
As airlines scrambled to renew fleets last year, Airbus said it had won 2,319 gross orders and 2,094 net orders after cancellations. Confirming a Reuters report, it said it delivered 735 airplanes, leaving its order backlog at 8,598.
Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury said the planemaker, which analysts say made a slow start to the year as it wrestled with tight supply chains, had seen "increased flexibility and capability" in its industrial system.
He added that he was confident Airbus would meet a delivery target of 75 A320 jets a month in 2026, with ten assembly lines active for the A320 family.
"The situation in the supply chain is still tense. It's improving, it's getting better, but we are also flying higher as we continue to ramp up in 2024," Faury told a news conference.
Boeing, which is still recovering from a safety grounding of its 737 MAX followed by a spate of production problems, said this week it had delivered 528 aircraft in 2023 and booked 1,314 net new orders after allowing for cancellations.
Christian Scherer, who in January stepped up from the top sales job to become CEO of commercial aircraft, the core plane making business at Airbus, said aviation had recovered faster than expected from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Demand for wide-body jets was rebounding particularly sharply, he said, adding in a statement: "Travel is back and there is serious momentum".
He added that making up for the backlog quickly was a priority for the European planemaker.
"The responsibility is to live up to this commitment to deliver a backlog of 8600 aircraft on time, on quality," he told a press conference.
Boeing is under fresh scrutiny over production following a cabin blowout that prompted a partial new grounding of one type of 737 MAX. Analysts said this is also happening against a backdrop of lingering supply tensions across the industry. |
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| From: John Koligman | 1/16/2024 5:46:52 PM | | | | | | Boeing’s stock tumbles after report warns investigation will open ‘a whole new can of worms’
By David Goldman, CNN
6 minute read
Updated 5:38 PM EST, Tue January 16, 2024
Members of the NTSB examine the hole in the fuselage plug area of Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 on a Boeing 737 Max 9.
NTSB/Handout/Getty Images
New YorkCNN —
As if Boeing needed any more bad news, a scathing report from Wall Street on Tuesday cast doubt on Boeing’s ability to pass a new federal safety audit, sending its stock sinking sharply. Later Tuesday, Boeing announced an independent adviser who will lead a review of the company’s quality control.
The Wells Fargo report, entitled “FAA audit opens up a whole new can of worms,” noted that Boeing’s quality control and engineering problems have been ongoing for years. After part of an Alaska Airlines] 737 Max 9 jet fell off the plane mid-flight, the likelihood of the US Federal Aviation Administration coming out of its investigation without significant findings was very low.
“Given Boeing’s recent track record, and greater incentive for the FAA to find problems, we think the odds of a clean audit are low,” the analysts said. “The FAA’s audit is limited to Max 9 for now, but it’s feasible that findings could expand the scope to other Max models sharing common parts.”
The analysts believe the investigation increases significantly the risk that Boeing takes a hit to its production and deliveries, and they downgraded the stock to “equal weight,” down from “overweight,” the equivalent of a “buy” rating.
Boeing is letting airlines into its factories as preliminary inspections begin on the 737 Max 9
Boeing’s ( BA) stock tumbled 8% on the report.
The FAA last week opened an investigation into Boeing’s quality control after the Alaska Airlines incident. The regulator said the dramatic in-flight blowout on Alaska Airlines 1282 “should have never happened and it cannot happen again.”
The door plug, which is supposed to cover up a space left by a removed emergency exit door in the side of the plane, blew off the aircraft and left a gaping hole in the side of the plane. The force of the explosive decompression and subsequent high-speed airflow inside the cabin ripped headrests off seats as the plane flew at 16,000 feet shortly after taking off from Portland, Oregon, carrying 177 people.
Some passengers were injured, but in an extraordinary stroke of good luck, no one was seated next to the door plug, and there were no fatalities.
The FAA says the investigation will focus on whether Boeing “failed to ensure completed products conformed to its approved design and were in a condition for safe operation in compliance with FAA regulations.”
Boeing declined to comment Tuesday, but said it “will cooperate fully and transparently with the FAA and the NTSB on their investigations” in a statement last Thursday.
Boeing turns to former military leaderTo help respond to those investigations, Boeing is naming an independent adviser to review quality control on its commercial airplane production lines.
Boeing Tuesday said a team of outside experts headed by retired US Navy Admiral Kirkland H. Donald “will conduct a thorough assessment of Boeing’s quality management system for commercial airplanes.” The company is following through after announcing last week it would bring an outside adviser to help assess its quality control.
Boeing says Donald and his team will also look at “quality programs and practices” in Boeing factories as well as those of Boeing’s suppliers, reporting their findings back to Boeing’s board of directors.
In a statement, Boeing CEO David Calhoun said the review will “provide an independent and comprehensive assessment with actionable recommendations for strengthening our oversight of quality in our own factories and throughout our extended commercial airplane production system.”
The company would be “taking a hard look at our quality practices in our factories and across our production system,” said Stan Deal, the Boeing executive who oversees its commercial airplane division, on Monday.
Ahead of today’s move, Deal wrote in a memo to employees obtained by CNN that the company would be performing more inspections of each 737 before they are delivered. He also said Boeing is now more closely monitoring the work of a key supplier that builds the 737 Max fuselage.
Last week, FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker said he was considering requiring “an independent third party to oversee Boeing’s inspections and its quality system.”
Boeing’s mistakeA week ago, Calhoun acknowledged the company’s “mistake” at a staff-wide “safety meeting,” but he did not specify what that mistake was. National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy has demanded Boeing provide answers about any mistake it made as part of its safety investigation, which is separate from the FAA’s audit.
Although the investigation is ongoing, and it remains unclear what caused the door plug to blow off the plane, two airlines with a large number of 737 Max 9 planes in service — Alaska Airlines and United Airlines — said they found either loose hardware or bolts in the assembly of door plugs on their aircraft. United says its discovery pointed to possible installation issues.
In a letter to Boeing last week, the FAA gave the company 10 days to supply any information on the cause of the Alaska Airlines incident. It also wants to know what actions Boeing has taken to prevent it from happening again.
Wells Fargo analysts noted in their report that the FAA investigation could take some time to complete, noting many of its probes remain “under investigation” months after the original incidents.
All 737 Max 9 planes remain grounded as the FAA works to approve Boeing’s inspection criteria for airlines to assess the safety of the aircraft. The regulator has not provided a timeline of when the planes might return to service. Alaska and United have canceled more than 100 flights a day as they await an all-clear from the FAA.
A history of quality control problemsBoeing has faced repeated quality and safety issues with its aircraft for five years now, leading to the long-term grounding of some jets and the halt in deliveries of others.
The 737 Max’s design was found to be responsible for two fatal crashes: one in Indonesia in October 2018 and the other in Ethiopia in March 2019. Together, the two crashes killed all 346 people aboard the two flights and led to a 20-month grounding of the company’s best-selling jets, which cost it more than $21 billion.
Internal communications released during the 737 Max grounding showed one employee describing the jet as “designed by clowns, who in turn are supervised by monkeys.”
What travelers need to know about the Boeing 737 Max 9 grounding
Late last month, Boeing asked airlines to inspect all of their 737 Max jets for a potential loose bolt in the rudder system after an airline discovered a potential problem with a key part on two aircraft.
Its quality and engineering problems have extended beyond the 737. Boeing also had to twice halt deliveries of its 787 Dreamliner, for about a year starting in 2021 and again in 2023, due to quality concerns cited by the FAA. And the 777 jet also suffered a grounding after an engine failure on a United flight scattered engine debris onto homes and the ground below.
Two Max variants — the Max 7 and the Max 10 — are still awaiting approval to begin carrying passengers. This latest incident complicates that, Wells Fargo analysts noted.
“The Max 7 and Max 10 variants… are now likely to receive greater scrutiny,” they said. “This includes a required safety waiver that, while probably reasonable, looks politically difficult to grant given recent events.” |
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| From: Eric | 1/17/2024 3:29:29 PM | | | | | | FAA reviews data from preliminary inspections of Boeing 737 MAX 9
Jan. 17, 2024 at 11:30 am
The lower section of a door plug seen on an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 MAX 9 aircraft awaiting inspection at the company’s maintenance facility at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Jan. 10. (Lindsey Wasson / The Associated Press)
An Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 MAX 9 aircraft awaits inspection outside the airline’s hangar at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Jan. 10. (Lindsey Wasson / The Associated Press) By
Lauren Rosenblatt
Seattle Times staff reporter
The Federal Aviation Administration has begun reviewing data from 40 preliminary inspections of Boeing 737 MAX 9 aircraft, potentially a small step toward returning the aircraft to service.
The agency grounded the planes after a piece of fuselage blew out of Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 after it took off from Portland. The piece that blew out – creating a gaping hole and rapidly depressurizing the cabin – was a door plug that some airlines use to fill a spot where an emergency exit can be installed.
After the incident, the FAA grounded the Boeing 737 MAX 9 planes that fill the space with a door plug. Those 171 planes have remained parked at airports while Alaska and United Airlines, the two U.S.-based carriers that operate MAX 9s, wait for inspection instructions from Boeing and the FAA.
Only the planes that fill the hole with a door plug will need to be inspected.
The FAA said Friday it would not approve Boeing’s proposed inspection instructions until it had reviewed data from the first 40 inspections. On Wednesday morning, the FAA said the first round of inspections had been completed.
The FAA’s announcement is not a sweeping sign that the Boeing 737 MAX 9 is headed back to the skies. Rather, it is an incremental step in what is expected to be a lengthy process.
“All 737-9 MAX aircraft with door plugs will remain grounded pending the FAA’s review and final approval of an inspection and maintenance process that satisfies all FAA safety requirements,” the agency said in a statement Wednesday.
“Once the FAA approves an inspection and maintenance process, it will be required on every grounded 737-9 MAX prior to future operation,” the statement continued. “The safety of the flying public, not speed, will determine the timeline for returning these aircraft to service.”
More on Alaska Airlines and the Boeing 737 MAX 9
Alaska said it began inspecting its fleet of 65 MAX 9 aircraft on Saturday. The MAX 9 makes up about 20% of the airline’s fleet, and the grounding has led to 110 to 150 flight cancellations every day.
United said the grounding has impacted about 200 flights per day.
Now that the first inspections have been completed, the FAA and Boeing will compile the findings and determine the “next steps in order to return the 737-9 MAX fleet safely back to service,” Alaska CEO Ben Minicucci said in a video statement sent to customers Wednesday.
Minicucci said there isn’t yet an estimate for how long that process will take.
At Alaska’s Seattle hanger, he walked through an inspection with the maintenance and engineering team and “witnessed firsthand the rigor they bring to their work,” Minicucci said.
The National Transportation Safety Board is leading the investigation into the fuselage blowout on Alaska Flight 1282. The FAA has opened a separate investigation into Boeing’s quality control systems and the manufacturer’s role in what led the door plug to come loose.
Boeing has said it will comply with both investigations. It declined to comment on the FAA’s announcement Wednesday about the first round of preliminary inspections.
Spirit AeroSystems – Boeing’s supplier that builds the fuselage for the MAX 9 – said Wednesday it supports “Boeing’s efforts with the FAA and the affected airlines as they inspect the 737-9 fleet and work to safely return those airplanes to service.”
Alaska said last week it planned to increase its own oversight of Boeing’s production line in order to ensure its planes were safe to operate. The airline “engaged in a candid conversation” with Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun and the company’s leadership team to discuss quality improvement plans and began a “thorough review” of Boeing’s quality and control systems. That review will include Boeing’s production vendor oversight.
Alaska also said it would hire more professionals to validate the work and quality on the 737 MAX 9 production line.
Lauren Rosenblatt: 206-464-2927 or lrosenblatt@seattletimes.com; on Twitter: @LRosenblatt_.
seattletimes.com |
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| From: Eric | 1/21/2024 1:46:33 PM | | | | | |
Boeing & Aerospace
Boeing hit by quality lapses, certification delays; Airbus soars to dominance
Unfinished 777X aircraft sit at Everett’s Paine Field in January 2022. Certification of the 777X passenger version is long delayed, and the jet is not expected to enter service until late next year. (Jennifer Buchanan / The Seattle Times, 2022)
Jan. 21, 2024 at 6:00 am Updated Jan. 21, 2024 at 6:00 am
By
Dominic Gates
Seattle Times aerospace reporter
While Boeing’s leadership scrambled to contain its latest crisis — following the in-flight door plug blowout on an Alaska Airlines 737 MAX 9 — top executives at Airbus confidently laid out the rival’s success in 2023 and its dominance of the commercial airliner business.
The data on last year’s jet orders and deliveries released by both manufacturers shows Airbus was the world’s No. 1 airplane maker for the fifth straight year and pulling away from its U.S. competitor.
Airbus delivered 735 commercial jets last year, compared to Boeing’s 528. And Airbus won almost 2,100 net orders, a new record, versus slightly over 1,300 for Boeing.
About 1,700 of those Airbus orders were for its wildly successful A320neo and A321neo jet family. That’s nearly twice the orders Boeing won for its competing 737 MAX jets.
That data combined with the new sense of crisis at Boeing has produced a bleak outlook among observers of the company.
“I cannot see how Boeing can continue like this,” said longtime industry expert Adam Pilarksi, of aviation consulting firm Avitas. “They are getting killed.”
The window of a door plug is exposed for inspection on an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 Max 9 aircraft at the airline’s facilities at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Jan. 10. Boeing has... (Lindsey Wasson / The Associated Press)
Throughout last year’s series of quality lapses and production setbacks, Pilarksi — who is personally close to many top executives and engineers within Boeing — remained one of the industry figures most staunchly positive about the company.
In an interview, he said the Alaska Flight 1282 debacle was the last straw for him and many inside Boeing.
“Boeing has been outplayed for a number of years and it looks worse and worse,” he added. “There’s no great hope. There’s no new leadership.”
“There’s a high probability Dave Calhoun will not survive long as CEO,” Pilarski said Friday.
In the wake of the Alaska Airlines close call, Ron Epstein, an aerospace engineer and Bank of America equity analyst, also questioned the viability of Boeing’s current leadership.
“We would not be surprised to see regulators, investors and customers push for a turnover in the ranks of senior management and the Board of Directors,” Epstein wrote in a note to investors.
Sash Tusa, a lead aviation analyst with London-based research firm Agency Partners, said via email the stark and growing imbalance in favor of the European jetmaker in the 2023 performance data offers little hope of a Boeing recovery.
“Based upon orders and backlogs, it is incredibly hard, mathematically all but impossible, to see Boeing getting back to No. 1 again, absent a MAX-type massive problem at Airbus,” Tusa wrote.
Attendees photograph an Airbus A350-1000 passenger jet at the Dubai Air Show in the United Arab Emirates in November. Delta Air Lines ordered 20 of these jets this month, a substantial win for Airbus. (Christopher Pike / Bloomberg)
Airbus confident in growth plans
As Boeing CEO Calhoun struggled to deal with the outrage over the Alaska Airlines incident, he made few public appearances. He gave one interview to CNBC and Boeing posted some excerpts from remarks he made at town hall meetings with employees at both Boeing and Spirit.
“I have confidence in Boeing. I have confidence in the airplane, and I have confidence in you,” he told the employees in Renton. “Be aware of everything around you and pay attention to every detail that matters.”
Boeing’s management has worked largely behind closed doors, focused entirely on the crisis, searching for answers and fixes that could reassure regulators, airlines and air travelers. Awaiting the outcome of an investigation, publicly the company has issued only terse written statements.
Asked for its responses to Airbus’ dominant year in 2023 and to the potential impact the Alaska Flight 1282 incident will have on that rivalry in the year ahead, Boeing declined to comment.
Spokesperson Bobbie Egan said that until company earnings are reported later this month “we are limited in what we can say.”
In stark contrast, Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury and the company’s new Commercial Airplanes CEO Christian Scherer held a news conference on Jan. 11 in Toulouse, France, to tout the company’s 2023 performance.
Formerly sales chief at Airbus, this month Christian Scherer became CEO of Airbus Commercial Airplanes, allowing Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury to focus on broader strategic issues. (Airbus)
The Airbus executives exuded confidence, took questions easily, and spoke of accelerating production and plans for new planes in the 2030s. For the Airbus leadership, clearly the present looks very good and all eyes are on the future.
Most Read Business Stories
While Scherer called last year’s production and sales results “pretty exceptional,” Faury said Airbus production is on track to meet much more ambitious targets.
Growing demand
With air travel now fully back after the COVID downturn, demand for jets is at record levels while supply from the world’s two major manufacturers is still well below pre-pandemic levels. So Airbus is gearing up.
From delivering in 2023 an average of about 48 A320neo family jets per month, Airbus projects reaching 75 per month in 2026.
Between Hamburg in Germany, Toulouse in France, Tianjin in China and Mobile, Ala., Airbus currently runs eight final assembly lines for those narrowbody airplanes and by 2026 will add two more lines, one in Tianjin, another in Mobile.
For the widebody A350 jets, which averaged just over five deliveries per month last year, the 2026 target is 10 jets per month.
For the small narrowbody A220 jet, against which Boeing has no competing airplane and that averaged nearly six deliveries per month in 2023, the 2026 target is 14 per month.
An Airbus A220 comes together at the Airbus Canada assembly plant in Mirabel, Quebec, in 2021. Airbus bought this small-jet series from Bombardier when the Canadian jetmaker could no longer finance the... (Graham Hughes / Bloomberg, 2021)
“We are in a steep ramp-up on all programs,” Faury said.
In the narrowbody jet market, the Airbus lead looks unassailable.
Deliveries of the largest and most expensive jet in that category, the A321neo, in 2023 made up well over half of all Airbus narrowbody deliveries and that share is growing as airlines look to put the jet on long routes.
In the second quarter this year, Airbus expects to deliver the first of a new extra-long-range model, the A321XLR. It’s already taken orders for 550 of those, which airlines will use on international routes instead of more expensive widebody aircraft.
“That’s a game-changing aircraft that will rewrite long-haul travel from this year onwards,” Scherer said.
Boeing has nothing to compete with the A321neo, never mind the XLR version.
But could Airbus be accelerating too fast? As it pushes production rates up, is it risking a setback similar to Boeing’s?
After all, Spirit AeroSystems, which was behind several quality lapses that affected Boeing production last year and installs the door plug that blew out on Alaska Flight 1282, is also a major supplier of parts to Airbus.
A worker installs components on a LEAP-1A engine for an Airbus A320neo narrowbody passenger aircraft during assembly at the Safran plant in Villaroche, France, in 2021. The A320 jet family has far outsold... (Nathan Laine / Bloomberg, 2021)
Tusa in London said Airbus has over many years benefited from reasonably steady production rates, compared to Boeing’s tendency toward wild rate swings and cutting production drastically during downturns.
“More constrained by European labor laws,” and supported by European governments to sustain employment, Airbus is “far more focused on production stability,” Tusa said.
At the news conference, Faury said Airbus is “monitoring very closely everything that comes out of the ongoing investigation” of the MAX flight incident.
“We will continue to put a lot of priority, a lot of attention, on quality to serve safe airplanes,” he said.
A Boeing 777-9 passenger aircraft, a variant of the forthcoming new 777X, at the Dubai Air Show in the United Arab Emirates in November. Large orders in Dubai gave Boeing hope of a recovery in its fortunes. (Christopher Pike / Bloomberg)
Can Boeing hold onto its advantage in big jets?
Using market pricing data from Pilarski’s firm, Avitas, The Seattle Times estimates the dollar value of the 2023 commercial jet orders at $153 billion for Airbus and $115 billion for Boeing.
The jet deliveries from Airbus are estimated to be worth about $48 billion compared to about $39 billion for Boeing.
One spark of hope for Boeing in the data is that the U.S. jetmaker managed to hold onto its historical lead in the larger widebody market.
Boeing delivered 132 widebody aircraft to 96 for Airbus. And Boeing sold 431 widebody jets to 278 for Airbus.
This was mainly due to the success of the 787 in both new orders and deliveries.
However, Pilarski said that segment of the market could slip away from Boeing, too.
The Airbus widebody A350 is gaining momentum and achieved a huge win this month when Delta ordered 20 of the biggest model, the A350-1000.
Delta already operates 28 of the smaller A350-900s and by the end of the decade will be flying 60 Airbus A350s internationally.
“The A350-1000 will be the largest, most capable aircraft in Delta’s fleet,” said Delta CEO Ed Bastian.
Clearly, Delta wasn’t prepared to wait for Boeing’s forthcoming giant jet, the 777X. Certification of the 777X passenger version is long delayed, and the jet is not expected to enter service until late next year.
In addition, Airbus previously did not compete in the widebody freighter market. Two years ago it launched the A350F freighter, which now has 50 orders.
A new global aviation carbon emissions standard threatens to force the shuttering of Boeing’s current 767F and 777F widebody freighter programs four years from now. Neither of those jets won any new orders last year.
That means in the immediate future, widebody cargo jet sales campaigns may be more even battles than in the past, with t he freighter version of Boeing’s 777X competing against Airbus’ A350F. The 777X cargo version isn’t due to enter service until 2027, two years after the A350F.
The 777X has to have a successful debut if Boeing is to stem the A350’s momentum.
Boeing “better get their 777X finally on time and become a spectacular plane,” said Pilarski. “Otherwise I don’t see how they can survive.”
777 freighters are seen in various stages of assembly at Boeing’s Everett assembly plant in 2022. Boeing’s historical dominance in the widebody cargo jet market is threatened by a new global aviation carbon emissions standard that could shutter the 777 freighter line at the end of 2027. (Jennifer Buchanan / The Seattle Times)
A vision for the future?
Despite pressure from the success of the A321neo, Calhoun last year declared Boeing won’t launch an all-new airplane anytime soon, saying the company must first focus on trying to get production back on track and much-needed cash coming in.
In contrast, Airbus’s Scherer outlined a vision for the 2030s.
“The next decade will be a defining period for our company, with a hydrogen-powered airliner and a very fuel-efficient successor to the A320 program,” Scherer said at the news conference.
For Pilarksi, Calhoun’s stance was acceptable as long as his strategy was achieving its goal. The Alaska Flight 1282 incident suggests it is not.
Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun speaks during a ceremony for the delivery of the final Boeing 747 jumbo jet on Jan. 31, 2023, in Everett. (AP Photo/John Froschauer)
Calhoun “told the world, we’re not thinking about the future until we fix what we are doing now,” Pilarski said. “It turns out, he doesn’t know how to fix the present.”
After the MAX production setbacks last year, Boeing had hoped for a fresh start in 2024.
Things looked to be headed up toward the end of 2023, with big sales wins in November at the Dubai Air Show and 67 jet deliveries in December, the highest monthly total for the year.
But the hope for a turnaround has now been set way back.
The Alaska in-flight incident has grounded MAX 9s, will inevitably slow future production because of the need for extra inspections, and could cause the FAA to delay certifying the final two MAX models, the MAX 7 and MAX 10.
Boeing’s customers, the airlines, are hurting from the grounded airplanes. The trust of both the regulators and the traveling public is broken.
From his contacts inside the jetmaker, Pilarski said he knows that “there are more and more people at Boeing who are very, very unhappy.”
Dominic Gates: dgates@seattletimes.com; on Twitter: @dominicgates. Dominic Gates is a Pulitzer Prize-winning aerospace journalist for The Seattle Times.
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| From: roto | 1/23/2024 11:32:46 AM | | | | | | nytimes.com
Boeing Made a Change to Its Corporate Culture Decades Ago. Now It’s Paying the Price.
Jan. 23, 2024
Credit...Sam Whitney/The New York Times
By Bill Saporito
Mr. Saporito is a journalist who has covered airline operations.
We often use the word “iconic” to describe companies such as Xerox, or U.S. Steel, or General Electric when we really mean “no longer great.” And Boeing no longer is. |
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| To: roto who wrote (3604) | 1/23/2024 11:50:13 AM | | From: roto | | | | United Airlines CEO says the airline will consider alternatives to Boeing’s next airplane
The Associated Press
January 23, 2024, 11:26 AM
The United Airlines CEO says he is “disappointed” in ongoing manufacturing problems at Boeing that have led to the grounding of dozens of United jetliners, and the airline will consider alternatives to buying a future, larger version of the Boeing 737 Max.
United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said Tuesday that Boeing needs “real action” to restore its previous reputation for quality.
Kirby’s comments came one day after United disclosed that it expects to lose money in the first three months of this year because of the grounding of its Boeing 737 Max 9 jets.
United has 79 of those planes, which federal regulators grounded more than two weeks ago after a panel blew out of an Alaska Airlines Max 9 in midflight, leaving a gaping hole in the plane. Investigators are probing whether bolts that help hold the panel in place were missing or broke off.
Kirby said on CNBC that he believes that the Max 9s could be cleared to fly again soon, “but I’m disappointed that the manufacturing challenges do keep happening at Boeing.”
At times over the past few years, manufacturing flaws have held up deliveries of Max jets and a larger Boeing plane, the 787. Last year, United received 24 fewer Boeing aircraft than it expected.
United has a standing order for Max 10 jets, a larger version of the Max line. However, that model and a smaller one, the Max 7, are years behind schedule for being certified by the Federal Aviation Administration. The grounding of the Max 9 jets is likely to further complicate Boeing’s drive to get the new models approved.
Kirby said the Max 10 is at least five years behind schedule and could be pushed further into the future.
“I think this is the straw — the Max 9 grounding — is probably the straw that broke the camel’s back for us,” he told CNBC. “We’re going to at least build a plan that doesn’t have the Max 10 in it.”
Kirby wasn’t specific about what planes the airline could acquire instead of the Max 10, but he noted that there is only one other global manufacturer of such large planes — Boeing’s European rival Airbus.
Doing without the Max 10 probably means United won’t grow as fast as it had hoped, Kirby added.
Stan Deal, CEO of Boeing’s commercial airplanes division, apologized for the Max 9 grounding and said the company is making changes.
“We have let down our airline customers and are deeply sorry for the significant disruption to them, their employees and their passengers,” Deal said in a prepared statement. “We are taking action on a comprehensive plan to bring these airplanes safely back to service and to improve our quality and delivery performance.”
Shares of United Airlines Holdings Inc. rose 6% Tuesday. After the end of regular trading Monday, the company said it would lose up to 85 cents per share in the first quarter but earn $9 to $11 per share for all of 2024.
Shares of The Boeing Co. fell less than 1%.
Copyright © 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.
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| To: roto who wrote (3605) | 1/23/2024 12:00:51 PM | | From: John Koligman | | | | One wonders if the 'revolving CEO door' at BA will start spinning again soon.
Edit:
I seem to recall that a lot of this quality nightmare for BA began after they made a decision to outsource more of their work as a 'cost savings measure'. One of their subs, Spirit AeroSystems, seems to often be mentioned when problems crop up. |
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