Boeing 787 "dreamliner"

[eastern]

Anyone feeling a bit hesitant about flying on the 21st centuries latest advanced passenger jet! Especially when it seems to keep catching on fire. OK I know it wasn't the dodgy batteries but even so it's hardly reassuring.

[sandyRoe]

A while ago there was the DC10 which had problems with its doors. They'd sometimes fall off.

[EcclesCake]

Statistically a pilot under the influence of drink or drugs is a bigger worry.

Not that either worry me as the journey to the airport is riskier still.........

[eastern]

Wasn't the DC-10 problem the engines falling off! I think the Sioux City crash in 89 was a DC-10 which had a catastrophic engine failure.

[douglas9401]

No.

[mushroom25]

the dc10's persistent early issue was the locking mechanism of the cargo door. after AA96 lost its door at Windsor Ontario a solution was designed but because there was no airworthiness directive it wasn't mandated. The result was the loss of Turkish 981 at Ermenonville in 1974.

AA191 lost an engine at Chicago in 1979 as a result of a flawed maintenance regime, the plane was a hull loss because the left wing slats lost control pressure, retracted and stalled the wing.

United 232 suffered an uncontained fan disk failure, but again the crash at Sioux City was due to an almost total loss of control pressure.

of a total fleet size of 446, there were 32 hull loss incidents and just over 1200 occupant fatalities, which compares favourably with other craft of the same era.

[eastern]

Back to my original question here on Answerbank, will you fly on a 787 Dreamliner?

[douglas9401]

Yes.

[eastern]

So much for lively debate!!!

[Just-Jude]

The 787s are full of cheap Chinese wiring in an effort to cut costs. When all the auxillaries are running, it starts to melt and catch fire, they'll have to strip it out and start again.

I always fly by Airbus!

[FredPuli43]

Yes, though I don't find the answer of operators, that they have every confidence and have passenger safety above all, reassuring. Think I might say that if I'd just spent 100s of millions of dollars on buying some !

[Wrangler3]

Yes. I work in the airline industry and can assure you that no pilot in any reputable airline would consider taking the plane into the sky if he wasn't confident of getting back. I can't wait to try the Dreamliner and the A380. Go and enjoy.

[eastern]

I doubt that anyone is going to "go and enjoy" sitting in airliner that has the unenviable reputation of firstly being grounded because it's batteries caught fire and secondly caught fire due to what I gather was an electrical fault that manifested itself when the plane was effectively shut down. Boeing have designed an aircraft that has so many revolutionary parts and building methods that effectively the worlds airlines and hence their passengers are the test pilots. On top of that one of the new Thomson holidays aircraft had to return on route to the USA with a serious malfunction, possibly undercarriage. Thanks all the same but I think I'll wait for next tried and tested aluminium plane.

[EDDIE51]

The road journey to the airport is at least 2,000 times more dangerous than any flight.

[EDDIE51]

For the inside information on this and any other aviation matter just look up this web site .PPRUNE the Professional Pilots Rumour Network
http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/518971-ethiopean-787-fire-heathrow-16.html
This gives the latest of the 787 fire ( don't read it if you are a nervous passenger) or SLF (Self Loading Freight as pilots call passengers)
As others have mentioned cost cutting is at the root of this !

[heathfield]

The use of plastics in wing surfaces and fuselage puts me off. I was horrified to learn, after 4 lengthy trips in Airbus 380s, that they too are built using the same materials. By the way, Mushroom, we lost a work colleague in the DC10 crash just outside Paris on 3 March 1974 - cargo door again.

[eastern]

I too have read the entire thread on PPrune.org and that is what unnerved me about this whole thing. I also read an article a while ago about how companies are becoming "risk averse" and one of the top companies was Boeing hence the reason it effectively farms out the manufacture of the Dreamliner components. As for the A380 at least Airbus seem to have got it right, so far anyway, it was the engines that let them down.

[237SJ]

Well I wouldn`t say the A380 completely got it right because although they had problems with the engines, they tried to reduce the weight of the aircraft by changing the wing ribs and they suffered cracks as a consequence.

[CreonCastle]

I do feel hesitant, however it wouldn't overly prevent me from being a passenger in one.

You can't always control the wind, but you can control your sails - Anthony Robbins