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FULL TITLE: Special Conditions: Boeing Model 777-200, -300, and -300ER Series Airplanes; Aircraft Electronic System Security Protection From Unauthorized Internal AccessEXCERPT: Discussion The integrated network configurations in the Boeing Model 777-200, -300, and -300ER series airplanes may enable increased connectivity with external network sources and will have more interconnected networks and systems, such as passenger entertainment and information services than previous airplane models. This may enable the exploitation of network security vulnerabilities and increased risks potentially resulting in unsafe conditions for the airplanes and occupants. This potential exploitation of security vulnerabilities may result in intentional or unintentional destruction, disruption, degradation,...

<p>MILAN (AP) — Foreign ministry officials in Rome and Vienna confirm that names of two nationals listed on the manifest of the missing Malaysian airlines flight match passports reported stolen in Thailand.</p> <p>Italy's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that an Italian man whose name was listed as being aboard is traveling in Thailand and was not aboard the plane.</p>

Boeing Co said on Friday that "hairline cracks" had been discovered in the wings of about 40 787 Dreamliners that are in production, marking another setback for the company's newest jet. The cracks have not been found on planes that are in use by airlines and therefore posed no safety risk, Boeing said, adding the problem also will not alter Boeing's plans to deliver 110 787s this year. Wing-maker Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd notified Boeing in February of the problem, which arose after the Japanese company altered its manufacturing process. He added that the manufacturing change was probably aimed at...

<p>South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley didn’t mince words when she spoke about unions at an automotive conference in Greenville this week. The state loves its manufacturing jobs from BMW, Michelin and Boeing and welcomes more, she explained, but not if they’re bringing a unionized workforce with them.</p>

Australia has confirmed that it will acquire eight Boeing P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, with the first examples to be delivered in 2017. The aircraft will be fully operational by 2021, says prime minister Tony Abbott in a statement. His statement pegs the deal’s value at A$4 billion ($3.6 billion). “These state-of-the-art aircraft will dramatically boost Australia’s ability to monitor its maritime approaches and patrol over 2.5 million square kilometres of our marine jurisdiction – an area equating to nearly 4 per cent of the world’s oceans,” says Abbott. Canberra has also approved an option for an additional four examples....

Rejections by India and more recently Brazil – combined with the looming end to a multi-year procurement deal for the US Navy – mean that the pressure is mounting on Boeing to secure extra orders for its versatile Super Hornet. As things stand, the last F/A-18E/F or EA-18G Growler will roll off the line in St Louis, Missouri before the end of 2016, with the USN and Royal Australian Air Force the buyers so far. As you can read in my colleague Jon Hemmerdinger’s report on the situation, that’s not a major problem for the manufacturer for now, but Washington...

Boeing is struggling to complete 787 fuselage sections in South Carolina since a production rate increase, and sections are arriving in Everett more unfinished and problematic than before. Since late last year, Boeing 787 Dreamliner fuselage sections from North Charleston, S.C., have arrived at the Everett final assembly line seriously incomplete with wiring and hydraulics lines missing, according to multiple sources in the factory. The poorly done work out of Charleston threatens to undermine the company’s plans to deliver 10 Dreamliners a month and fulfill the much-delayed jet program’s original promise. “It’s snowballing. The planes are getting worse out of...

U.S. aircraft manufacturer Boeing has silently delivered the first airborne early-warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft to Turkey under a program that was launched more than a decade ago. Now, however, the buyer and the seller are wrangling over penalties for delays. The defense procurement agency, the Undersecretariat for Defense Industries (SSM), and the Turkish Air Force simultaneously announced Jan. 31 that the AEW&C aircraft had arrived in Turkey for acceptance tests. The tests are to be followed by an inauguration ceremony Feb. 21 at the 3rd Main Jet Base Command in Konya, they said. Last year, Defense Minister İsmet Yılmaz...

Boeing painted a plane with the Seahawks logo, including a big 12, and today that plane is flying over eastern Washington in a 12 pattern. You can see the progress here. There are signs with "12" on them all over Seattle. This town is totally into it.

A new Boeing Co. (BA) surveillance aircraft deployed to Japan last month isn’t yet effective at hunting submarines or performing reconnaissance over large areas -- two of its main missions, the Pentagon’s weapons tester found. Flaws in the $35 billion program included the plane’s radar performance, sensor integration and data transfer, Michael Gilmore, chief of the Pentagon testing office, wrote in his annual report on major weapons, which has yet to be released. He said the new P-8A Poseidon exhibited “all of the major deficiencies” identified in earlier exercises when subjected to more stressful realistic combat testing from September 2012...

Boeing Co is hiring contract workers at its factory in South Carolina as it boosts output of the 787 Dreamliner and seeks to avoid manufacturing issues linked to the production increase, according to people familiar with the situation. Boeing confirmed on Wednesday that it is hiring at the facility but declined to provide details. The company was responding to a Wall Street Journal report that said the aircraft maker is adding about 300 contract mechanics and inspectors at its North Charleston facility. The Journal said the contractors were needed in part to avoid production issues with 787 body sections made...

Battery problems resurfaced on Boeing's 787 on Tuesday, after gas was discovered coming out of a battery on a plane parked in Tokyo. Boeing said the problem on a Japan Airlines 787 was discovered during scheduled maintenance. No passengers were on board. The company said it appears that a single battery cell 'vented', or released gas. The incident comes a year after a fire in a lithium ion battery aboard a Japan Airlines 787 parked at Boston's Logan International Airport.

The separate complaints focus on the timing of the union vote that narrowly approved Boeing’s 777X contract extension.Four individual Machinists at Boeing have filed separate complaints with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) seeking to overturn the 777X contract extension vote that passed by a slim margin last week. Anne Pomerantz, NLRB regional attorney, said the agency will investigate the charges, gather evidence and decide if any action is warranted. The process typically takes approximately 12 weeks, she said. The union members filed the unfair labor practices claims against the national headquarters of the International Association of Machinists (IAM), which...

The workers voted 51 percent to 49 percent in favor, responding to pressures from top union officials and Washington State lawmakers, who warned that Boeing might place 777X production elsewhere, potentially costing Washington more than 10,000 jobs.

SEATTLE/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Boeing's machinists on Friday narrowly approved a crucial labor contract that secured thousands of jobs and billions of dollars of economic activity for Washington state but will cost workers their pensions. The vote of 51 percent to 49 percent to accept the deal means Boeing Co will build its new 777X jetliner and wings in the Seattle area, where Boeing has built aircraft for more than 90 years. Had the workers rejected the offer, Boeing would have considered making the successor to its popular 777 widebody jet elsewhere, and had received offers from 22 states interested...

Some 31,000 Boeing machinists vote on Friday on a crucial labor contract that affects the location of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars of economic activity. If the workers accept the deal, Boeing Co. would build its new 777X jetliner and wings in the Seattle area, where Boeing has built aircraft for more than 90 years. If they reject it, Boeing says it will make the wings and possibly the whole plane, elsewhere, marking a major employment and economic loss for Washington state. Boeing says it has received offers from 22 states interested in hosting a new factory to...

As the Big Apple’s tax base shrinks, its municipal costs skyrocket, increasing the urgency that it get its financial house in order. So I’ll make a bold prediction: New Yorkers may someday regret electing a man who says he does not believe in the free market system. “Everything you heard about me is true…I am not a free-marketeer…I believe in the heavy hand of government,” Mayor-Elect Bill de Blasio recently told a meeting of major real estate developers. (snip) Amazingly, this erstwhile reader of Barricade magazine isn’t the most radical city politician lately to sweep into power. Meet Kshama Sawant,...

Inside a cavernous assembly line in El Segundo, Northrop Grumman employees build the center aft fuselage and vertical tail — everything behind the pilot except the wings — for the F/A-18 Super Hornet. Roughly 900 local Northrop employees help build this plane, the Navy’s workhorse fighter jet that has seen action in such theaters as Iraq and Afghanistan. To date, Northrop and prime contractor Boeing have delivered more than 2,100 planes, including earlier versions and an electronic warfare variant. However, those Northrop employees and thousands more throughout California and nationwide face the prospect of an end to the Super Hornet...

MOSCOW, December 23 (RAPSI, Ingrid Burke) - A US federal court on Wednesday granted in part and denied in part a motion by American aerospace and defense conglomerate Boeing to dismiss counterclaims filed by Russian space giant Energia in its $355 million lawsuit, according to court documents obtained by RAPSI. In February, plaintiffs The Boeing Company (Boeing) and Boeing Commercial Space Company (BCSC) filed a complaint against Energia and Ukrainian company Yuzhnoye SDO alleging breach of contract in connection with with the 1995 establishment of Sea Launch, a joint venture created to facilitate the sea-based launch of commercial satellites. Boeing...

(Reuters) - Dilma Rousseff was thoroughly charmed. Brazil had been struggling for years to decide which company to choose for a $4 billion-plus fighter jet contract, one of the world's most sought-after defense deals and one that would help define the country's strategic alliances for decades to come. But Rousseff, the leftist president known for being sometimes gruff and even standoffish with foreign leaders, was thrilled after a 90-minute meeting in Brasilia on May 31 with U.S. Vice President Joe Biden. After Biden's reassurances that the United States would not block crucial transfers of technological know-how to Brazil if it...

It’s a compelling story: Brazil gets mad at the US for the NSA spying revelations, and snubs Boeing BA -0.46% for its long-awaited FX-2 fighter buy. Sweden gets $4.5 billion in business, and the U.S. pays a big economic price for eavesdropping on a neighbor. Countless articles have cited the NSA as the biggest factor, or at least a very big contributing factor, in Brazil’s decision. Yet sometimes, a fighter procurement decision is just a fighter procurement decision. There’s a chance the NSA scandal played a role in Brazil’s decision. But it’s just as likely that this decision was an...

(Reuters) - Brazil on Wednesday is expected to announce it chose Sweden's Saab (SAABb.ST) to supply its Air Force with a new generation of fighter jets, according to a Brazilian government source. Brazilian media on Wednesday also reported that Saab had emerged the victor for the long-pending contract, negotiated over the course of a decade and involving three consecutive Brazilian presidencies. The government source told Reuters that the contract was awarded after Brazil decided that Saab provided the most affordable option for the new jets as well as the best conditions for technology transfer to the South American country. Brazil...

If the Machinists union and Boeing could agree to a contract deal, Washington state would secure decades of work fabricating the 777X airliner’s advanced wing and assembling the jet here. Yet the union is divided and in turmoil over what the company calls its best and final offer. Two distinct, passionate arguments boiled up among the 31,000 local Machinists after their leaders Thursday rejected the revised offer. One vocal faction, including the local leadership, is dug in, unwilling to give up its hard-won gains from the past by making concessions on pay and benefits. Another group, including officials from the...

Boeing will nearly triple its footprint near Charleston International Airport with the acquisition of even more land than expected in a $49 million deal announced Friday. The land purchase comes one day after the Chicago-based aerospace giant announced hundreds of new research jobs for the Charleston area. Analysts believe the land deal paves the way for Boeing to eventually move all 787 production to North Charleston. Boeing declined to comment on the speculation. "This expansion makes future growth in North Charleston possible," said Jack Jones, vice president and general manager of Boeing South Carolina. "While we expect to begin the...

After talks broke down between Boeing and the Machinists union over placing the 777X work in Washington state, the union’s lead negotiator said the membership will get a chance to decide on what the company had said was its last offer.Washington’s bid to place work on the 777X jet in the state may not be dead yet, despite the abrupt collapse Thursday afternoon of negotiations between Boeing management and the Machinists union. In a phone interview late Thursday, the Machinists union’s lead negotiator said rank-and-file membership will get a chance to decide on the Boeing offer that the union leadership...

Within the last few minutes, local news is reporting that Aircraft Machinists Union 751 has offered a new proposal to Boeing, one would guess to try to convince Boeing not to move the manufacture of the 777-X out of state. I will post details if/when they become available.

Boeing and Saab AB have signed a Joint Development Agreement (JDA) to offer a solution for the US Air Force's (USAF) T-X trainer requirement, the companies announced on 6 December. Boeing will lead the effort to develop and build a replacement platform for the USAF's aging fleet of Northrop T-38C Talon aircraft, with Saab acting as the primary partner. "We will invest in development of this completely new aircraft design over the coming years," Saab President and CEO Håkan Buskhe said in a statement. As noted by Bushkhe, and reiterated to IHS Jane's by a Saab spokesperson, the new aircraft...

777 plant in Greensboro?

This is the terrifying moment a plane almost landed sideways as ferocious winds hit the UK yesterday (Thurs). Passengers told how they watched the drama unfold on the TV screens on the plane. Some started vomiting as the pilot struggled to control the 777.

Boeing has issued a formal request for proposals (RFP) to 15 locations around the United States that will bid for the work of building its forthcoming 777X jet, according to a source close to the discussions. Washington state is one of the 15 sites under consideration. The others include both existing Boeing locations and new “greenfield” sites, the source said. Boeing spokesman Doug Alder confirmed Saturday that the RFPs were sent out late Friday afternoon and into the evening.

Seattle’s newly elected Socialist councilwoman accused aerospace and defense giant Boeing on Monday of “economic terrorism” and told Boeing machinists they should consider taking “over the factories.” “The workers should take over the factories, and shut down Boeing’s profit-making machine,” Kshama Sawant told a group of activists in the city’s Westlake Park. Sawant’s comments were made at a rally organized by machinists after they rejected a deal that would reduce pensions for union members in return for guaranteed jobs in Everett, Wash., building 777X Boeing airliners for eight years. Now Boeing is considering taking those jobs elsewhere. “That will be...

Here’s the inevitable follow-up on the election of a Socialist to the Seattle City Council — although perhaps sooner than anyone would have thought. Boeing has tried working for years with its unions in the state of Washington, but still cannot reach agreements on labor contracts for its manufacturing facilities. The aerospace giant has looked for other regions in the US to build its planes, which has angered the unions and the Obama administration. It’s also provided an opportunity for Seattle’s newest councilmember to launch her anti-capitalist agenda, and she’s wasted no time in doing so … even before officially...

A Boeing Dreamlifter cargo jet, with a cargo hold among the largest by volume, accidentally landed at the wrong airport in Kansas Wednesday night, and was unable to take off due to the short runway. According to KWCH News, this type of plane requires 9,200 feet to take off whereas the runway at the airport is only 6,101 feet.

An advertisement placed in The Seattle Times on Wednesday by a group hoping to encourage Washington state to keep up its fight to secure the coveted work on the new Boeing 777 includes a notable miscue. At the top of the full-page ad, under the all-caps text "The Future of Washington," is pictured not a Boeing jet, but rather an A320 from archrival Airbus.

WASHINGTON — The United States is battling to win Qatar’s multi-billion-dollar fighter-jet competition. Industry sources said the administration of President Barack Obama has been lobbying the Gulf Cooperation Council emirate to select a U.S. warplane for Doha’s largest combat air project. The sources said the administration has succeeded in delaying Qatar’s tender, which included proposals from Britain and France. “After Saudi Arabia, the Qatar project will be the biggest aircraft procurement for years to come,” a source said. The sources said Qatar, which established an evaluation panel, was moving slowly in a tender for up to 72 advanced fighter-jets, a...

SEATTLE — Seattle City Councilmember-elect Kshama Sawant told Boeing machinists her idea of a radical option, should their jobs be moved out of state “The workers should take over the factories, and shut down Boeing’s profit-making machine,” Sawant announced to a cheering crowd of union supporters in Seattle’s Westlake Park Monday night.

Shares of Boeing (BA) climbed into the green early Monday after the jet maker unveiled fresh orders for its upcoming 777x and struck a new supply deal with a major firm in the United Arab Emirates. The Chicago-based Dreamliner maker racked up roughly $100 billion in orders with Middle Eastern carriers on the first day of the 2013 Dubai Airshow. The 342 orders in the fast-growing market doubled those awarded to rival Airbus.

With the news last week that Machinists’ union members employed by Boeing in Puget Sound overwhelmingly rejected a proposed contract that would have meant years worth of work on the new Boeing 777X, much of the attention was focused on what it would mean for union members’ future and where the work would go following their rejection. As the long-term contract they voted down had numerous concessions, it is understandable that it would have been a hard sell to get the members to accept it. Yet, that hard sell by local union leaders did not take place. In fact, the...

DUBAI—Emirates Airline on Sunday placed a $76 billion order with Boeing Co. BA +0.73% at the Dubai airshow for 150 of the manufacturer's new 777X aircraft, helping make the model the largest product launch in commercial jetliner history. The Dubai-based carrier, which is the world's largest international airline by capacity, is the biggest scalp so far for Boeing as it is the largest operator of the manufacturer's current 777 fleet, with more than 120 in service. Qatar Airways, meanwhile, placed an order for 50 Boeing 777X worth $19 billion, and Emirates said it had purchase rights for a further 50...

On August 27, Boeing flew the Advanced Super Hornet demonstrator for reporters and visiting delegations from Denmark and Brazil at its St. Louis facility. Visible are the Northrop Grumman conformal fuel tanks on the upper fuselage and Boeing-build centerline enclosed weapons pod. The sunset could be farther off than thought for the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, the mainstay of the U.S. Navy’s carrier-based fighter fleet. With initial operational capability of the F-35C Joint Strike Fighter that will eventually replace the F/A-18 now planned in early 2019, Boeing and partner Northrop Grumman are proposing an “Advanced Super Hornet” upgrade designed to operate...

SEATTLE (AP) — Boeing's history in the Pacific Northwest dates back more than a century, when William Boeing purchased a Seattle shipyard that would become his first airplane factory. In recent years, however, those ties have been fraying, first with the company shifting its headquarters to Chicago, then with the development of a new production line in South Carolina. Now, the relationship between Boeing and Washington state is near the point of unraveling after a fiery debate among machinists this week led the workers to reject a long-term contract. On Thursday, Boeing made good on its threats and said it...

The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) leadership had negotiated a new contract with Boeing that would have taken effect in 2016. The deal called for cuts in wage increases for union members, reduced health care benefits and lower company contributions to its defined benefit retirement plan. Some 67% of IAM members voted to reject the deal, and the union local president said that members had “preserved something sacred by rejecting the Boeing proposal. We’ve held on to our pensions and that’s big. At a time when financial planners are talking about a ‘retirement crisis’ in America, we...

This will probably come as no surprise to those who watched the federal government stepping in to help unions strongarm manufacturers in the last few years, but Boeing is back in the news with more labor issues. The aerospace giant is getting ready to unveil their newest jet – the 777X – which had been widely expected to be built in the Seattle area as so many of their other lines have been. But at the last minute, the unions decided the deal wasn’t fat enough for their tastes. Boeing workers’ rejection of a new labour deal has sent the...

Members of the Machinists union vote today on a contract with Boeing that the aircraft maker says will determine whether it will build the next generation of its 777 jets at its Seattle manufacturing hub. About 20,000 jobs at Boeing and its suppliers are riding on the decision of where to build the 777X, which is set to become a key part of its fleet. Also at stake is the Machinsts' pension plan, which will be converted into a 401(k) type of retirement program if the contract is approved. That change has sparked anger among Boeing workers, and raised the...

<p>NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) -- Boeing broke ground on another South Carolina manufacturing plant on Tuesday and company officials said the initial job of making jet engine air inlets could one day be expanded to a variety of propulsion work.</p>

EVERETT -- A couple hundred Machinist union members held an unofficial rally Monday outside their union hall near Paine Field to protest a contract extension offer negotiated in secret by the Boeing Co. and the union's international leadership.The message: Boeing's promise to build the 777X in Everett, in exchange for significant changes in retirement and health benefits, among other things, will undercut the union and is a bluff by the Chicago-based company's leadership."They're trying to kill us. Period," said Wilson Ferguson, a delivery mechanic on the 737 line in Renton and president of Local A. "At the end of the...

A dramatic showdown is underway in the State of Washington, pitting Boeing against its largest labor union, the International Association of Machinists (IAM). If the union, voting Wednesday, rejects a proposed contract that includes lower health care benefits, Boeing is threatening to move production of its next generation airliner, the 777X, out of the Puget Sound region, to such locations as Charleston, SC (where it is assembling the new 787) or Texas, right-to-work states where the union's demands would hold no sway. The Washington State Legislature takes Boeing's threats very seriously, indeed. Boeing has long complained about the tax burden...

(Reuters) - The Washington state Senate on Saturday passed a measure to extend nearly $9 billion in tax breaks for Boeing through 2040 in an embattled effort to entice the company to locate production of its newest jet, the 777X, in the Seattle area. Lawmakers acknowledged, however, that their efforts would likely be undermined if the airplane maker's key machinists union votes down a proposed labor contract due to go to before the membership on Wednesday.

Machinists are expressing anger at the terms offered by Boeing to win the 777X work for Everett. Boeing said in a statement that the company is ready to "pursue other options" outside Washington.In a dramatic end to a meeting with hundreds of disgruntled Machinists at the Seattle union headquarters Thursday night, District 751 President Tom Wroblewski tore up a copy of Boeing’s contract proposal and said he would try to have it withdrawn. “I know this is a piece of crap,” Wroblewski said about the proposed new eight-year agreement that Boeing says will determine whether the forthcoming 777X jet is...