The Federal Aviation Administration 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 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.
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, Wash., to Moses Lake and
back.
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(c)2013 The Seattle Times
Distributed by MCT Information Services
