Runways at London's Heathrow airport have closed after a fire on a parked Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 787 Dreamliner jet. BBC News - Heathrow shut after Boeing Dreamliner 787 fire Image Unavailable, Please Login
Oh dear! Weren't they all meant to be retrofitted with the "guaranteed fix" prior to being allowed to fly again? Closing LHR seems a little excessive too...... Cheers, Ian
No matter what the actual cause.... bad news for Boeing. Credibility is on the line here. Big question has to be was it batteries or not. This was the first commercial flight of this plane since the grounding.
Interesting location of the fire. Is that the rear galley or lavs? Here's an interesting question: How do you repair the burnt CF? Does the entire fuselage have to be replaced?
$#@!, $#@!, $#!@ I HATE to see this. Hopefully it was something like a vacuum catching fire during cleaning but either way this is terrible for Boeing. $#@!
Doesn't look good. This diagram shows the batteries for the APU are located near that burnt area of the fuselage. You would think that the APU was being used by a parked airliner. Looks really similar in circumstance to the Boston fire. Not proof... but not good either. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Strange location for the fire damage, and looks like a totally different area from the Boston/battery fires where smoke could be seen coming out of the rear lower cargo door near the battery location. Not sure what could be up there. Lots of wiring for sure. I recall reading once that a plane caught fire because the devise that supplies power to the over head oxygen masks had shorted. In automotive when CF burns we replace it.
Looking at the burned area on top It does not look like the battery was at fault here as it is located int the electronics bays in the cargo area under the floor of the passenger compartment. Hard to say what happened here unless like mentioned the APU was running and the harness shorted out and caught fire in the roof area.
Where did you read/hear that? This particular plane/registration has been flying since mid-May and was actually one of the first 787s to return to service with passengers.
Yeah I heard Ethiopian Airlines were the first to bring out the Screamliner again for passenger service, back in April or so. Infact plane ib Heathrow was the very first to make that flight after the grounding. Flight was on April 27th Addis Ababa - Nairobi. Another one going to Florida for Thomson Airlines had to return to manchester airport because of technical difficulties.
The APU battery in that diagram is located in BOTTOM of the airplane in the aft cargo bay, just aft of the cargo door.. Nowhere near the top of the fuselage.
The power feeders for the APU are in the bottom of the airplane. A fire in the ceiling could be caused by anything, regardless of whether the APU was running or not.
just go to autozone/advanced auto /walmart and buy some damned car batterys and fix the problem already,they cant do any worse then now
I understand that. However, heat would rise where that spot would be. Of course there is no proof. But you have to wonder if either it's the batteries or something else, this plane has the unfortunate reputation for fire now.