Further delay of Boeing Dreamliner announced

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Progress on the long-awaited Boeing 787 Dreamliner is delayed once again, according to a company announcement on Tuesday. Boeing said that a section of the aircraft needed to be reinforced before test flights could commence.

A new date for the first test flight has not been set for the medium-sized plane that airlines are expecting to be the future backbone of their long-haul fleets.

The company’s statement said: “It will be several weeks before the new schedule is available.”

Scott Carson, the Boeing president and CEO, was quoted in the statement as saying: “Structural modifications like these are not uncommon in the development of new airplanes.”

Boeing originally indicated that the first Dreamliners would be delivered in May of 2008, but that delivery date has been delayed at least three times previously.

Major carriers, including British Airways, Continental and Qantas, plan to deploy the 787 on what they refer to as “long, thin routes”, or those requiring less capacity than the 747.

By the time that Boeing announced the third delay, in April of 2008, nearly 700 Dreamliner orders had been placed.

The delays experienced with the 787 are similar to those that Airbus faced in the development and delivery of the A380 super-jumbo, which was delayed by two years and saw significant cost overruns before the first flight occurred in October of 2007.

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