Boeing has made plans to accommodate any delays in the first-flight schedule for its new Model 787 twin-aisle twinjet now in final assembly at Everett, Washington. The first aircraft is scheduled to be rolled out on July 8 and will be the company’s first new airliner for 13 years. Having overcome various circumstances that already have led to subassemblies arriving incomplete from suppliers, the U.S. manufacturer is being characteristically frank in conceding the possibility of slippage beyond a one-month window already built into the program.
The 787 is programmed to fly around “the end of August, or in September,” officials saying that there was a four-week allowance from the initial date before further delay would put pressure on the May 2008 service-entry date. On the eve of the show here in Paris, Boeing Commercial Airplanes president Scott Carson reportedly estimated “mid-September” as a prospective date for first flight, a timing not challenged here yesterday by 787 program general manager and vice-president Mike Bair.
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