Boeing delays 787 Dreamliner to early 2010

Boeing Co said the 787 Dreamliner is now almost two years behind schedule and won’t reach customers until the first quarter of 2010, the fourth delay for the best- selling new aircraft in the planemaker’s history.

The jet won’t fly for the first time until next year’s second quarter, after factories were idled for eight weeks by a machinists’ strike and some fasteners had to be replaced, Chicago-based Boeing said in a statement on Thursday. The most recent goals had been to fly by the end of this year and ship the planes in the third quarter of 2009.

Boeing is “finalising and incorporating remaining engineering changes and completing systems testing, qualifications and certification” to prepare for the flight, program manager Pat Shanahan said in the statement. Boeing is still revising the delivery schedule for customers, and the financial impact will be announced at a later date.

The 787, unveiled in July 2007, was due to enter service with All Nippon Airways Co in May this year after Boeing’s shortest-ever flight-test program, arriving as airlines clamored for more-efficient planes to counter higher fuel prices. The Dreamliner has instead been beset by parts shortages, incomplete work from with suppliers and the recent strike, setting Boeing further behind in its goal of surpassing Airbus SAS.

“It’s like deja vu, all these things coming back to haunt us — fasteners, flight-testing concerns and further delivery delays,” Rob Stallard, an analyst at Macquarie Research Equities in New York, said in an interview Wednesday.

Boeing has orders for 895 Dreamliners valued at about $155 billion. The planemaker, led by Chief Executive Officer Jim McNerney, has lost about 60 per cent of its market value since the first 787 delay, in October 2007.