Boeing 787 Dreamliner jet likely to make its maiden flight in June 2009

The Boeing 787 Dreamliner passenger jet is getting ready for its maiden flight, most likely by the end of June 2009.

Update: Boeing Dreamliner test flight by end Dec 2009.

The Boeing Company announced in a press release that the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, which was already two years behind schedule, was “continuing to analyse data from recent tests on the plane and the initial results were positive.”

Scott Fancher, vice-president and general manager of the 787 Dreamliner programme, said in the press release that fuel testing for the new plane would start within the next few days.

If the rest of Boeing’s tests go according to plan, the company is expecting to start delivering the planes to airlines in the first quarter of 2010, Fancher added.

The Boeing 787 Dreamliner is a mid-sized, wide-body, twin-engine jet airliner. According to the company, the aircraft will carry between 210 and 330 passengers depending on the variant and seating configuration.

Boeing claims that the 787 Dreamliner would be more fuel-efficient than its earlier planes and that the Dreamliner would be the first major airliner to use composite materials, instead of aluminum, for most of its construction.

The Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft, which the company describes as a “revolutionary, carbon-composite aircraft,” is being assembled near the Boeing Company’s plant in Seattle, Washington, the United States, “from parts made around the world.”

Most of the Dreamliner’s structure, according to the Boeing Company, was made in Japan and Italy and joined in South Carolina, and then flown to the manufacturing plant at Everett for the final assembly.

Scott Fancher said there were 886 orders for the Dreamliner plane from 57 customers.

The Dreamliner was originally scheduled to start flying in the summer of 2007, but had to be putt off as many as four times because of production glitches as well as a two-month strike by the Boeing Company’s mechanics.

The company said that eight Dreamliner aircraft were in various stages of assembly – with two of them meant only for ground tests and never intended to fly.

The other 6 Dreamliner jets will form the fleet of planes that Boeing will fly for a total of 3,500 hours over an 8-month period or a 9-month period to meet the strict certification standards of the United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Scott Fancher said in the press release.

Fancher added that the first Boeing 787 plane that is scheduled to fly is the same plane that was “rolled out in front of thousands of cheering Boeing employees in July 2007, then hurriedly pulled back for more work.”

If the new plane passes all the tests, All Nippon Airways of Japan will take delivery of the first Dreamliner in the first quarter of 2010, almost two years after the initial delivery date of May 2008.