Boeing grapples with a ‘Pandora’s box’ on 787

The manufacturing quality inspection and rework saga for Boeing’s 787 is now nearing the one-year mark.

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Even as Boeing works to explain its detailed statistical analysis to the Federal Aviation Administration of its inspection findings on its fleet of undelivered 787 Dreamliners, the company continues to disclose new issues with its aircraft that further disrupt its path toward resetting its production system and restarting deliveries.

The manufacturing quality inspection and rework saga for the 787 is now nearing the one-year mark since they were first reported by The Air Current. In that time, Boeing’s most important twin-aisle jet has been sidelined by a combination of slack demand exacerbated by the pandemic’s impact on international travel, and manufacturing issues that stretch from the jet’s fuselage joins and the aircraft’s vertical and horizontal stabilizers to the passenger and cargo door structures.

Most recently, Boeing and the FAA disclosed a new issue on the forward pressure bulkhead that sits behind the nosecone of the aircraft that requires an invasive and time consuming fix.

“They opened Pandora’s box,” said a Boeing staffer directly familiar with the inspections and modifications required on the aircraft.

Jon Ostrower

Jon Ostrower is Editor-in-chief of The Air Current. Prior to launching TAC in June 2018, Ostrower served as Aviation Editor for CNN Worldwide, guiding the network's global coverage of the business and operations of flying. Ostrower joined CNN in 2016 following four and half years at the Wall Street Journal. Based first in Chicago and then in Washington, D.C. he covered Boeing, aviation safety and the business of global aerospace. Before that, Ostrower was editor of the award-winning FlightBlogger for Flightglobal and Flight International Magazine covering the development of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner and other new aircraft programs from 2007 to 2012. Ostrower, a Boston native, graduated from The George Washington University's School of Media and Public Affairs with a bachelor's degree in Political Communication. He is based in Seattle.

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