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DUBAI—Despite being “very, very disappointed” in the latest delay to certification of the 777-9, the program is advancing to the next stage of flight testing over the next few days with the start of FAA Type Inspection Authorization Phase 3, Boeing Commercial Airplanes President and CEO Stephanie Pope says.
“We’ll start doing that certification for score this week,” Pope said Nov. 16, confirming FAA clearance for continuing the test effort. “When we go into (TIA) Phase 3 and 4, I think we’ll focus on avionics and systems and work our way through that here over the next several months—but progress is being made.”
Pope’s comments, made on the eve of the Dubai Airshow, come less than a month after Boeing revealed that 777-9 first deliveries will not now take place until 2027—seven years later than planned when the program was launched in 2013. The move appeared to surprise some future operators, including Emirates President Tim Clark who said he was left “a little bit miffed” after hearing about the announcement.
While not addressing Clark’s comments directly, Pope said: “There’s always a lesson to take away from every single day and every single interaction. It is unacceptable to me for any of our customers to be surprised, and our focus is to be as transparent as possible.”
Flight tests for Phase 3 will immediately involve the first 777-9 development aircraft, WH001, currently on display at Dubai. Talking to Aviation Week at the show, Heather Ross, lead pilot on the WH001, says: “We’re going to be moving on to the next package of testing. We’ve got some up and away testing to do, plus some stability and control testing.”
“The airplane has some updates to do to be in configuration for that particular set of testing,” she added. Most of the updates are concerned with uploads of close to final software for the aircraft’s fly-by-wire flight control system.
Ross, who participated in a recent round of several weeks of takeoff performance certification testing at Edwards AFB, California, says the baseline 777-9 “handles and performs very well.”
There are tweaks that we’ve got, or minor things that may be discovered—or changed as a result of further analysis—but the truth of the matter is, from a handling perspective, this airplane has really been very good,” she says.
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