Friday, May 3, 2013

Transaero Airlines to get early build 787s

I got word that Boeing has officially allocated 3 very early build 787s to Transaero Airlines.  The three frames are ZA800 (LN 11), ZA801 (LN 12), and ZA803 (LN 14).  All three were previously going to be delivered to ANA but has since asked for later built 787s.  Boeing still has about 7 more that need to be re-allocated to other airlines.  These are among the group of 787s that are known as the "terrible teens."  It has been rumored that Transaero would pick up these aircraft from Boeing on the cheap when they closed on the order of 4 787s early last year.  It's also rumored that Lion Air will be picking up their 5 aircraft from this block as well but that change has yet to be reflected in the system.

Production flight testing has picked up today with ZA318 (LN 94, G-TUIB) for Thomson making its first flight today.  ZA512 (LN 83, JA818A) made it 12th flight and this aircraft should be delivered to ANA late next week though it still has to go through customer acceptance flight(s). Two Charleston built 787s for Hainan  swapped places today as ZA431 (LN 76, B-2722) flew back to Charleston and ZA433 (LN 81, B-2723) flew to Ft. Worth for painting from Charleston.
 






14 comments:

graeme77 said...

What can explain ZA380 being out on a test flight at 3 am on a Saturday morning?
Somewhat bizarre...

TravelingMan said...

It's a little surprising that there are still 9 of those early builds that they still haven't started reworking this late in the game. They must require a lot of rework.

Uresh said...

There are other planes in front of them getting worked on and who have confirmed customers waiting for them.

Roy Navon said...

How can ZA238 be listed as delivered on 3/28/2013 when there were no flights at this time?

Uresh said...

It was delivered in early Jan. before the grounding but for some reason Boeing didn't book it as delivered until March 28th.

Anonymous said...

so has NTSB found a smoking gun or a possible cause to the battery failure??Saw theres a story out calling for urgent CT scans on the 787 battery which im pretty sure has been done in the past so it makes me wonder what they are upto.

Andrew Munsell said...

Thats interesting, United is even flying their 787 at Narita is being flown to Lackland. http://flightaware.com/live/flight/UAL6875

Andrew Munsell said...

United is now restarting on May 20th

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20130508/us-travel-brief-united-airlines-787/?utm_hp_ref=homepage&ir=homepage

-Andrew

Trapperpk said...

The current battery solution will remain a viable stop Gap fix until root cause is determined. They (Boeing/FAA), will remain in an effort for finding the root cause within a controlled environment.


Uresh said...

The fix is not temporary nor a Sri gap measure. It is a permanent fix no matter what. This is wha Boeing has been saying.

AJ said...

It would be great to see an update on the fix for the 50. Who many complete to date?

Uresh said...

About half

Unknown said...

Have any idea when the Qantas plane makes it on to the line?

Uresh said...

Around June 21at.