Boeing 787 Delivery To Japan Airlines

Japan Airlines, second customer for the 787, will contractually take delivery of its first 787 on March 25 before a flyaway departure to Tokyo the following day. The final regulatory hurdle before delivery was cleared earlier this week when the Federal Aviation Administration gave final approvals to both the original Block 4 and PIP1 GEnx-1B engines. The two GEnx configurations will be interspersed among the early GE-powered 787 deliveries.

JAL will not take delivery of not one, but two 787s on Sunday, the program's first dual delivery. Delivery of Airplane 23 (JA822J) is firm at this point, while Airplane 33 (JA825J) may be slated for a late afternoon Monday flyaway as well, say program sources.

Pratt & Whitney PW1500 certification trials
The PW1524G, Bombardier's CSeries CS100 engine, has begun major FAA certification trials with icing runs at the engine-maker Manitoba, Canada facility. Certification tests official began in mid-January with low pressure turbine stress tests. The engine has undergone more than 1,350h of full testing and nearly 250h under the wing of the company's Boeing 747SP test bed. As of last week, P&W had completed 2000h split between the PW1500G and MRJ's PW1200G engines covering more than 5,000 cycles.

Trent 1000 reliability tops 99.9%
Five months after its introduction with All Nippon Airways, the Trent 1000 engine has topped a dispatch reliability of 99.9%, says Rolls-Royce. The engine-maker notes it is the best introduction of a new RR engine, which has flown more than 4,000h since its late October service entry.

On 22 April, the carrier will start nonstop services between Tokyo and Boston with the aircraft.

Later this year, JAL will also launch a nonstop Tokyo-San Diego service operated with the same 787.

The carrier, which has 25 firm orders for the 787-8 and 20 for the 787-9, plans to deploy the aircraft on routes between Tokyo and Beijing, Moscow, New Delhi and Singapore once the aircraft are delivered.

JAL also unveiled the cabin configuration of the aircraft. There will be 186 seats - 44 in business class in a 2-2-2 configuration and 144 in economy class in a 2-4-2 configuration.