Boeing Chairman, President and CEO Jim McNerney issued the following statement after the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued an emergency airworthiness directive that requires U.S. 787 operators to temporarily cease operations and recommends other regulatory agencies to follow suit:
“The safety of passengers and crew members who fly aboard Boeing airplanes is our highest priority. Boeing is committed to supporting the FAA and finding answers as quickly as possible. The company is working around the clock with its customers and the various regulatory and investigative authorities. We will make available the entire resources of The Boeing Company to assist.”
"We are confident the 787 is safe and we stand behind its overall integrity. We will be taking every necessary step in the coming days to assure our customers and the traveling public of the 787's safety and to return the airplanes to service.
"Boeing deeply regrets the impact that recent events have had on the operating schedules of our customers and the inconvenience to them and their passengers,” the statement added.
Airlines scrambled on Thursday to rearrange flights as Europe, Japan and India joined the US in grounding Boeing Co's 787 Dreamliner passenger jets while battery-related problems are investigated.
The lightweight, mainly carbon-composite plane has been plagued by recent mishaps - including an emergency landing of a Japanese domestic flight on Wednesday after warning lights indicated a battery problem - raising concerns over its use of new technology, such as lithium-ion batteries.
The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on Wednesday temporarily grounded Boeing's newest commercial airliner, saying carriers would have to demonstrate the batteries were safe before the planes could resume flying. It gave no details on when that might happen.
Other regulators followed suit on Thursday.
It is the first such action against a US-made passenger plane since the McDonnell Douglas DC-10 had its airworthiness certificate suspended following a deadly crash in Chicago in 1979, analysts said.
Boeing has sold around 850 of the new planes, with 50 delivered to date. Around half of those have been in operation in Japan, but airlines in India, South America, Poland, Qatar and Ethiopia, as well as United Airlines in the United States, are also flying the aircraft, which has a list price of $207 million.
With most of that Dreamliner fleet now effectively out of action as engineers and regulators make urgent checks - primarily to the plane's batteries and complex electronics - airlines are wrestling with gaps in their scheduling.
Meanwhile, Qatar Airways, the largest customer for the Boeing 787 Dreamliner in the Middle East, has grounded its entire fleet of five 787s until the safety of the plane is confirmed.
Source: Boeing; Reuters
