Boeing Lost $5.5 Billion On 787 Dreamliner Delays

An American Airlines Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner approaches for a landing at the Miami International Airport on December 10, 2021 in Miami, Florida. The American Airlines company announced it will discontinue service to several international destinations in 2022 amid the ongoing shortage of Boeing 787 aircraft.

Boeing announced Wednesday it will pay customers $3.5 billion over delayed orders of its 787 Dreamliner aircraft and will lose another $2 billion in increased production spending in what spells the third straight year of massive losses for the aeronautics company. All told, Boeing ended 2021 $4.3 billion in the red, which is still an improvement over the $11.9 billion lost in 2020

Boeing delivered only 14 jets in the first half of 2021. The Federal Aviation Administration put a stop to deliveries of the 787 due to concerns over inspection methods, according to CNN. Manufacturing flaws popped up in 2019, when Boeing disclosed it found tiny spacing issues between segments making up some of the fuselages. Other problems emerged with materials from suppliers, and then in July 2021, the FAA found a manufacturing defect in the nose of a few 787s, CNBC reported. The 15-month delay in delivery is already causing problems for already beleaguered big airlines, leading to canceled flights.

The Dreamliner has been in operation for ten years now, according to CNN, and development was a slow, painful process from the start:

By the time the first of the initial batch of 50 787s was delivered to launch customer ANA in September 2011. The Seattle Times reported that development costs exceeded $32 billion. Boeing would break even at over 1,000 delivered units, but this would take another decade. The first aircraft was rolled out in a lavish ceremony on July 8, 2007 (7/8/7), but it had more in common with a mock-up than a flyable plane. It would be another two and a half years before the first 787 took flight on December 15, 2009. It was supposed to enter service in 2008 just prior to the Beijing Summer Olympics. New airline programs are notoriously behind schedule, but the 787’s was three and a half years late.

While several airlines told CNN they expect to take delivery of their Dreamliners in the spring, Boeing executives declined to put a time frame on when brand-new 787s would once again take to the skies. There are currently just over 100 Dreamliners waiting for FAA approval before they can be put into service.