ANA grounds Dreamliners
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All Nippon Airways (ANA) has been forced to ground five of its 11 Boeing 787 Dreamliners due to an engine problem.
The Japanese carrier, which was the launch customer for the B787, said the aircraft were grounded after Boeing discovered an issue with the gearbox of the B787’s Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines.
“We received a message from Boeing to the effect that there may be an issue with the gearbox on the engines of the 787s in the ANA fleet. No related problems have arisen on our 787s, however, we have ascertained that the part at issue is fitted to five of our 11 fleets. Working with Boeing, we will replace the part in question and return our fleet to an operating state as quickly as possible,” the carrier said in a statement.
Speaking to Travel Daily this morning, an ANA spokesperson confirmed that five B787s had been taken out of service on Saturday (21 July), but that two had already been fixed. The remaining three will take “another few weeks” to fix, according to ANA, as it needs to order parts from the UK.
Two domestic flights, connecting Tokyo Haneda with both Okayama and Yamaguchi, were cancelled on Saturday (21 July). All other flights will be operated as scheduled, using B767 aircraft to replace the Dreamliner.
ANA took delivery of its first B787 Dreamliner in September 2012, and has now received 11 out of a total order for 55 of the new, fuel-efficient wide-body aircraft. TUI and United are amongst other Dreamliner customers but have opted for a different engine model.
