What’s going on with the Boeing 777X 3 years after the first flight?
Boeing anticipates that its new widebody aircraft will be approved in under two years.
After multiple development hiccups, today marks three years since the Boeing 777X’s first flight. Boeing intends to be certified by the end of 2024 and to have the first 777Xs delivered to customers in 2025. See below for the most recent information about the Boeing 777X.
The first 777X flight was three years ago.
A three-hour, 51-minute flight later, the first Boeing 777X touched down at Boeing Field in Seattle on January 25, 2020. It had departed from Paine Field at 10:09. The 777X program, which was initially planned for a 2020 entry-to-service date, has been repeatedly plagued by delays, which have been made worse by the COVID pandemic.
Boeing’s most recent estimate has deliveries being pushed back by half a decade to 2025, and the program may still experience more problems. However, the test program has subsequently resumed as aircraft N779XW took to the skies once more on December 22nd.
In November, Emirates’ President Sir Tim Clark disclosed that the 777X test program had been suspended because to problems with the GE9X engine. Hopes were high for the widebody after receiving orders from launch customer Lufthansa, Cathay Pacific, Qatar Airways, and Emirates in 2013, which together totaled $76 billion, making it the largest aircraft order in history.
Although production and certification issues will unfortunately cause the jet’s arrival to be delayed for at least five years, will it all be worth it in the end?
costly delays, and will there be more?
The 777X program’s delays have cost Boeing billions of dollars. After taking a pre-tax charge of $6.5 billion in January 2021, Boeing wrote off another $1.5 billion in April 2022 after announcing that it now anticipates the first 777X deliveries to occur in 2025.
The 777X has also seen other failures, such as a cargo door blowing off during a stress test undertaken by the Federal Aviation Administration, which has delayed the inaugural flight until 2020 in addition to issues with the GE9X engine (FAA). a testbed update
Two of the program’s four test aircraft are currently in use (recently after N779XX resumed flights following a five-month pause), while its other two have not taken to the skies for more than six months, according to a recent Simple Flying investigation into the activity of Boeing’s 777X testbed aircraft.
Even if Boeing can adhere to its revised schedule, many customers won’t receive their aircraft in 2025. For instance, British Airways, which placed an order for a 777X in 2019, won’t receive its first aircraft until at least 2026. The most recent estimates have the 777X becoming certified before 2025.
