Dec. 15th first flight date reaffirmed...so far

Sources told me that Boeing is still tracking for a first flight on Dec. 15th and that testing is proceeding extremely well. This information is further reinforced by Flightblogger's post earlier this evening.

In his blog, Flightblogger says that Dreamliner 1 is expected to begin a 2 to 3 day final gauntlet starting as early as tomorrow and concluding around Wednesday or Thursday. During this testing Boeing will test the 92 systems on board the aircraft as put them through a simulated B1 first flight. They will also put the aircraft systems through simulated failures and observe how the systems react.

After the gauntlet test are completed and pending a favorable review of the static test data from ZY997 (static test air frame), Boeing will proceed into low/high speed taxi test as well as reject take off test (hopefully to take place the day before first flight). Of course first flight is again predicated up on successful review of the static data, the completion of the gauntlet and taxi tests and favorable weather in the Seattle area.

Flightblogger : ZA001 proceeds towards final gauntlet

Update: Matt Cawby has blogged that it looks like taxi tests will occur late this week into the weekend:

Matt Cawby's Dec. 7th Blog Post