U.S. air-safety investigators Tuesday said they are stepping up
microscopic and chemical examinations of the lithium-ion battery
that caught fire aboard a parked Japan Airlines Co. (9201.TO)
Boeing 787 three weeks ago, still seeking to determine whether
internal defects may have played a role in the blaze.
The National Transportation Safety Board also said that in
conjunction with Navy electronics experts, investigators are
examining an identical but undamaged rechargeable battery--which
didn't provide any obvious indications of malfunctions--removed
from the same Boeing Co. (BA) Dreamliner aircraft after the Boston
fire.
The experts, among other things, "will be looking for signs of
in-service damage and manufacturing defects' affecting that battery
as well as subtle "signs of any degradation in expected
performance," according to the safety board.
The latest update on the probe underscores that NTSB
investigators so far have failed to uncover any clear-cut evidence
about the cause of the Jan. 7 fire. As a result, they are now
circling back to pursue more-detailed analyses of internal battery
structures--as well as re-examining various elements of the overall
battery system--which they initially indicated didn't produce major
leads or breakthroughs.
In another move highlighting the expanding and increasingly
complex nature of the investigation, the safety board for the first
time said that the Chicago plane maker is "providing pertinent
fleet information" related to the 50 Dreamliners that were in
service world-wide before their grounding earlier this month.
The data are intended to help investigators learn about "the
operating history of lithium-ion batteries' on the planes, the NTSB
said, indicating safety experts hope to uncover new leads going
beyond the information already gleaned from examining hardware and
downloading information from flight-data recorders.
Boeing didn't respond immediately to a request for comment.
In its previous update over the weekend, the safety board didn't
indicate it had arrived at any significant findings from dissecting
the damaged battery, or from examining the onboard charging system
and a number of related electric components on the Japan Airlines
787 that are designed to prevent batteries from burning or
rupturing. Japanese investigators, conducting a separate but
coordinated probe, also have said they haven't detected any obvious
battery defects or other significant hardware malfunctions.
The safety board has said the battery on the Japan Airlines
plane experienced both short-circuits and a thermal runaway, a
condition in which the temperature of a battery cell starts to rise
dramatically and the heat spreads quickly to other cells inside the
battery.
A burning battery aboard an All Nippon Airways Co. (ALNPY,
9202.TO) Dreamliner on a Japanese domestic flight Jan. 16 led to an
emergency landing and evacuation. Regulators around the globe then
followed the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration's lead in
grounding all Dreamliners.
Despite the apparent lack of progress in the probes on both
sides of the Pacific, a key Boeing customer Tuesday said it is
confident there won't be any long-term impact on the 787's future
delivery schedule.
"We believe the 787 is a solid aircraft and have every
confidence that Boeing will have resolved the issues well in
advance of our scheduled deliveries in 2015." said Jeff Knittel,
head of the transportation unit at CIT Group Inc. (CIT). The
company's jet-leasing arm has placed the first four of its 787s,
due to arrive in 2015, with airlines. The planes are part of a
10-jet order.
Separately, Boeing said increased production of its cash-cow 737
jetliner was on track, boosting output to a rate of 38 a month on
the way to a targeted 42 a month next year.
The Dreamliner's travails sparked concern that diverted
resources could ripple through to other Boeing aircraft programs,
whose expansion is critical to boosting cash flow to fund pension
obligations and, potentially, a dividend increase or stock
buyback.
Boeing reports fourth-quarter earnings Wednesday, and a key
focus will be on the company's 2013 jet-delivery guidance--and
whether those projections include any Dreamliners.
During the initial phase of the U.S. probe, investigators from
the safety board and the FAA concentrated on mapping damage inside
the lithium-ion cells and checking quality controls at the GS Yuasa
Corp. (6674.TO) factory in Japan that manufactures batteries for
the 787. The NTSB early on asked for assistance from electronics
experts at the Naval Air Systems Command, an organization that has
been working for years on high-energy lithium batteries and
chargers able to detect problems inside batteries. A command
official declined to comment.
But in the past few days, U.S. and Japanese authorities have
disclosed that those early efforts focusing on internal battery
issues failed to produce many answers. So investigators, according
to people familiar with the matter, increasingly are shifting to
look at the interplay of battery performance with certain
electronic circuits and safeguards specifically intended to prevent
dangerous battery malfunctions.
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