Boeing Dreamliner still struggles to get off the ground
It's been over two months since Boeing's new 787 Dreamliner jet was used in its first commercial flight after being grounded for months because of battery problems earlier this year.
But Boeing's problems didn't go away with that flight. Since resuming commercial flights, the Dreamliner has had to make emergency landings and has been grounded for malfunctioning parts. Now new data shows that flights on United's Dreamliner (the only U.S. carrier currently using the Dreamliner) are being canceled four times more than the rest of United's fleet, according to Bloomberg.
The data gathered by Flightaware.com for Bloomberg, shows that flights on the Dreamliner were canceled 3.8 percent of the time from May 20 to June 26. Only one percent of flights were canceled for the rest of United's fleet. The new jet also runs late on 30 percent of flights for an average of 72 minutes, while the rest of the fleet is late on 24 percent of flights with the average delay at 63 minutes.
Still, numerous carriers are putting their trust (and money) behind the 787. Announcing a variation of the 787, Boeing was able to bring in more than 100 orders for the plane at the Paris Air Show last month. So carriers seem to be content that the 787 is just going through slight growing pains.
But while the 787 has been problematic for Boeing this year, Boeing is still having a solid year with 306 planes delivered (17 Dreamliners) through the first half of the year, more than rival Airbus.
Read more: Bloomberg
Photo: Flickr/John_Scone
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This post was originally published on Smartplanet.com