Boeing may axe 787-3 with ANA cancellation
Filed on Saturday, January 9th, 2010 under Aviation News By aviator
Boeing’s 787-3 mid-range variant is under a final threat of extinction following the decision by All Nippon Airways (ANA), the derivative’s sole customer, to change its order to other variants.
Commenting on his blog, Randy Tinseth, VP-marketing for Boeing Commercial Airplanes, said, “Simply put, getting aircraft into their hands for earlier delivery was a better solution for them. As a result there are no longer any 787-3 orders in the backlog. Going forward, we’ll continue to assess the market viability of the -3.”
Tinseth added that the ANA order conversion does not affect the overall 787 order count, which as of Jan. 7 stood at 851 from 56 customers.
The -3 was designed to seat up to 317 passengers within the same overall fuselage length as the 787-8, but with lower operating weights and a modified, shorter, 170-foot, 6-inch wingspan with winglets. Maximum takeoff weight for the shorter-range version was targeted at 375,000 pounds against 502,500 pounds for the -8 and 545,000 pounds for the stretched -9, while the shorter spanned derivative was aimed at an empty weight 20,000 pounds less than the -8. Service entry was originally set for 2010, but when Boeing hit further production problems in April 2008, the development schedule for the -3 was shifted and first deliveries were deferred to 2012 or beyond.
Forty-three 787-3s were originally ordered by ANA and Japan Airlines, but following the production problems, JAL converted its orders to -8s, while ANA cut back its -3 requirement to 28, while converting two to the longer-range model. Finally, ANA’s decision last month to convert its remaining -3 orders to -8s reduced the firm backlog for the type to zero.
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