It’s going to be a bit unbalanced with a wingtip on one side and not on the other. Nothing that can’t be corrected for through control inputs, of course. But it does leave rather less margin than was originally designed for.
A commercial aircraft is a fully tested design, and has to go through a lot of redundant trials in any configuration that is to be certified. I would be really surprised if the folks at Boeing bothered to certify the aircraft with only one wing-tip.
So certification is out the window. These people were being asked to fly on the World’s Biggest Experimental. Not that it can’t be done safely... but it just isn’t done.
I've seen on-site FAA certified stress engineers sign off on worse during simple C checks. The only problem here is that it was visible damage instead of corroded structural damage.
What a load of crap.
The 747 wing design was "certified" decades before these winglets were added. As stated earlier in the thread, the winglets serve no purpose other than to squeeze a few extra nautical miles per pound of fuel out of the aircraft. They have nothing to do with lift and nothing to do with control.
These winglets are about as important to the 747 as a spoiler is to a Honda Accord.