By David Shepardson and Valerie Insinna
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Boeing Co has temporarily halted deliveries of its 787 Dreamliner jets as the U.S. planemaker conducts additional analysis on a fuselage component, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said on Thursday.
Deliveries will not resume until the FAA is satisfied that the issue has been addressed, the agency said.
“The FAA is working with Boeing to determine any actions that might be required for recently delivered airplanes,” the agency said.
Boeing said in reviewing certification records it “discovered an analysis error by our supplier related to the 787 forward pressure bulkhead. We notified the FAA and have paused 787 deliveries while we complete the required analysis and documentation.”
Boeing said it discovered the error within the past week.
“There is no immediate safety or flight concern for the in-service fleet,” the company said. “While near-term deliveries will be impacted, at this time we do not anticipate a change to our production and delivery outlook for the year.”
The Wall Street Journal earlier reported that Boeing has not handed over a Dreamliner since Jan. 26 from the production line or from the dozens stored awaiting delivery because of a documentation issue.
Boeing shares fell 2.6% in extended trading following the disclosure after closing up around 1%.
In August, the FAA approved the first 787 for delivery since May 2021 after it approved the planemaker’s inspection and modification plan. Boeing delivered 31 787s in 2022 and said last month it expects to deliver between 70 and 80 787s this year.
Boeing Chief Financial Officer Brian West said last month on an earnings call “it’s going to take us a little bit longer” to get to producing five 787s per month later this year. “But we still see 70 to 80 in the cards,” West said.
Boeing had halted deliveries in 2021 after the FAA raised concerns about its proposed inspection method. In September 2020, the FAA said it was investigating manufacturing flaws in some 787 jetliners.
The current issue is unrelated to a previous quality problem involving gaps around the forward pressure bulkhead, which was discovered by the FAA in 2021 and contributed to a delivery stoppage that lasted until August 2022.
(Reporting by David Shepardson and Valerie Insinna in Washington and Anirban Chakroborti in Bengaluru; Editing by Shailesh Kuber and Bill Berkrot)
