ANA to cancel more Dreamliner flights

Japanese airlines All Nippon Airways (ANA), which currently has the biggest fleet of Boeing 787 Dreamliner jets, plans to cancel another 379 flights in February due to safety concerns, local media say.

The cancellations, including 245 flights on domestic routes over 12 days from February 1 and 134 on international routes over 18 days are expected to affect some 24,300 passengers, Japanese Jiji Press and Kyodo news agency reported on Saturday.

On January 16, ANA and Japan Airlines (JAL) suspended flights of all their Dreamliners following an emergency landing made by an ANA Boeing 787 Dreamliner with more than 130 people on board.

The two airlines operate 24 planes out of the 50 Dreamliners sold around the world so far.

According to Jiji, the latest cancellations brings the number of ANA flights suspended since the January emergency landing in western Japan to 838, affecting 82,620 travelers.

Airlines around the world have grounded Boeing’s technologically-advanced new 787 Dreamliner jet planes out of safety concerns associated with batteries aboard the aircraft.

The groundings stemmed from a US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) directive on January 16 that ordered all of Boeing’s 50 flagship 787 Dreamliners be kept out of service until the problems are solved.

“As a result of an in-flight Boeing 787 battery incident earlier today in Japan, the FAA will issue an emergency airworthiness directive (AD) to address a potential battery fire risk in the 787 and require operators to temporarily cease operations,” the FAA said in a statement.

Boeing 787 Dreamliner has been troubled by a series of bad news this week, including fire on a flight, fuel leak, a brake computer fault, and a cracked cockpit window, which could undermine global confidence in the aircraft.