Summary
- Kenya Airways operates nine of this type of aircraft, billed as more fuel-efficient, mainly for long-haul flights and at times for the medium range destinations.
- The flaws were found in the joint of sections toward the rear of the aircraft, according to a communication from Boeing last Friday.
- The manufacturer said all the jets that have been grounded as a result of this fault must be inspected and repaired before they can take to the skies again.
The aviation regulator will monitor Kenya Airways’ Boeing 787
Dreamliner fleet to establish compliance with safety requirements after
the US manufacturer raised concerns that have led to the grounding of
eight planes worldwide.
Boeing Company found two
distinct manufacturing faults affecting the fuselage of eight 787
Dreamliner jets and said the planes must be removed from service for
repair, raising concerns that others could also be facing the same
problem.
Kenya Civil Aviation Authority (KCAA)
director-general Gilbert Kibe said the regulator had received
communication from Boeing and is acting on it.
“There is ongoing surveillance on the airline to determine compliance,” Mr Kibe said in response to queries from the Business Daily.
Kenya
Airways operates nine of this type of aircraft, billed as more
fuel-efficient, mainly for long-haul flights and at times for the medium
range destinations.
Air Canada, United Airlines Holdings Inc and Singapore Airlines Ltd said they each had one of the eight grounded jets.
The
flaws were found in the joint of sections toward the rear of the
aircraft, according to a communication from Boeing last Friday.
The
manufacturer said all the jets that have been grounded as a result of
this fault must be inspected and repaired before they can take to the
skies again.
KQ, as the national carrier is known by
its international code, has been using its fleet of Boeing 787s to
transport cargo to Europe and Asia since the Covid-19 pandemic
diminished passenger travel.
The problems, which are
the second to be raised this year after another fault was detected on a
different model of Boeing planes, adds to the succession of woes for the
American manufacturer whose main rival is European multinational Airbus
SE.
Operators of the Boeing 737 New Generation
aircraft were forced to inspect afresh the engines of the planes after
the US aviation regulator warned that they could stall mid-air after
being grounded for months.
The Federal Aviation
Administration (FAA) said the planes that have been idle since the
outbreak of the pandemic could form corrosion on the air check valves,
an anomaly that can lead to stalling of the two engines when the
airplane is flying.
KQ has 10 Boeing 737NG — mainly
used for mid-range flights such as African destinations –in its fleet of
42. The FAA safety notice will affect more than 7,000 of 737NGs planes
that Boeing has delivered to carriers globally.
However,
most conspicuous of all is the Boeing 737 Max, which has been grounded
since March 2019 after two crashes killed 346 people aboard Indonesian
and Ethiopian carriers.
The company was forced to come
up with changes to this narrow-body’s flight control system and they
have been undergoing testing by the FAA. The planes are expected to be
cleared for flight by year-end.
The reports about the
Dreamliners’ defects comes at a time when KQ has opened talks with its
lessors to convert some of the planes to freighters as the carrier seeks
to utilise the idle capacity following a sharp drop in demand for
passengers.
The company’s chief executive officer,
Allan Kilavuka, said the negotiations to allow KQ to remove seats in
some of the aircraft and convert them into cargo transporters had
already begun.
Mr Kilavuka said the move will help the
carrier to use the large-capacity aircraft for long-haul cargo services
between Africa and other continents.
The national
carrier resumed international flights early last month with about 30
destinations for the first time since the routes were suspended in March
due to the pandemic.
This is down from the 56 destinations it was serving prior to the outbreak of the respiratory disease in the country.
KQ
said Covid-19 had hurt demand for air travel worldwide hence the need
to scale down the number of routes and flight frequencies.
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