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The FAA Will Let Boeing's 787 Dreamliner Fly Again

With three months of review and battery carriage fixes, Boeing's airplane of the future will soon return to the skies.
Image via Boeing

After three months of sitting on the ground, about 50 of Boeing's 787 Dreamliners will be able to return to the skies shortly, having won approval of its new battery housing design following a number of flaming battery incidents that had hampered the plane's launch.

Having completed intense review of the aircraft's flight systems and functionality, component reliability, two weeks ago Boeing completed testing on the last item on its list, the plane's battery housing. The FAA on Friday approved the new system. That means the 787, which Boeing has continued to build while new battery solutions were developed, will now be able to resume regular flights as soon as workers are able to carry out an overhaul of the planes that need the upgrade.

"FAA approval clears the way for us and the airlines to begin the process of returning the 787 to flight with continued confidence in the safety and reliability of this game-changing new airplane," Jim McNerney, CEO of Boeing, said in a news release announcing the approval.

It's a major sigh of relief for the aerospace company, which had received FAA orders to discontinue flying the plane following the widespread reporting of a couple of incidents involving fires that were later traced to a faulty battery compartment design. Boeing has built its future on the 787, which uses a special composite body to promise advanced levels of comfort and efficiency. Now that its battery saga is pretty much over, we'll soon find out if the Dreamliner can live up to its name.

@DanStuckey