'Nose job' puts AA's hail-damaged Dreamliner back in service
An American Airlines Boeing 787 "Dreamliner" that suffered a large dent to its nose in a hailstorm over China last month has returned to service, the airline announced in a playful tweet Monday.
"Oh hail, I'm not afraid to say it: I've had a little work done," American said in a tweet showing a before and after shot of the repaired plane. The airline used the phrase "NoseJob" as part of a shortened URL accompanying the tweet.
The Boeing 787 is the newest aircraft type to join American's lineup of planes. The one damaged in the July 27 incident had been in the carrier's fleet for less than three months, according to American. The plane, flying as AA Flight 88, was bound for Dallas/Fort Worth when it returned to Beijing after encountering hail. There were 209 passengers and a crew of 13 on the flight, American said at the time. No one was injured.
The plane returned to service Monday morning on a flight from Dallas/Fort Worth to Chicago O'Hare. It continued on a subsequent flight to Tokyo Narita.
As for the repairs that allowed the jet to return to service, American spokeswoman Andrea Huguely told Today in the Sky the plane's radome -- or the nose-cone area of the plane -- was replaced in Beijing. The aircraft was then flown to Tokyo Narita where the two outer panes of the cockpit windows were replaced.
The plane then flew back to to the United States on Aug. 3, where final repairs were then made to the aircraft at AA's maintenance facilities at Dallas/Fort Worth and Tulsa.
The plane's carbon-fiber composite fuselage did not sustain any damage, though AA said some other repairs were required. Among those: landing and navigational lights, trailing and leading edges of the wings, engine caps and cowlings, horizontal and vertical stabilizers and panels on underside of wings. AA said it worked closely with Boeing and engine-maker GE on the repairs.
The incident drew attention via social media when it occurred in July, with a photo of the damaged aircraft circulated on Twitter and elsewhere. American's playful tweet seems to have completed the social media loop now that the plane is returning to service.
American took delivery of its first Dreamliner in April. The carrier began flying paying passengers on the jet in May on domestic routes before shifting it to mostly international service in June. In addition to Beijing, American also uses its Dreamliners for flights to Buenos Aires, Tokyo and Shanghai.
American currently has nine 787-8 models of Boeing's Dreamliner in its fleet. The aircraft has a list price of $224.6 million, according to AP, though big airlines like American typically get large discounts on their aircraft orders.
Boeing's Dreamliner flew its first regularly scheduled passenger flight in October 2011, operating on a round-trip between Tokyo and Hong Kong on Japanese carrier All Nippon Airways.
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