Japan tests battery on Dreamliner

TOKYO, 10 April 2013: Japanese aviation authorities on Monday began two days of  battery tests on a grounded 787 Dreamliner at an airport in western Japan, officials said.

Four officials from the Japan Transport Safety Board (JTSB) started checking the battery system of the All Nippon Airways airplane that has been grounded at Takamatsu airport for nearly three months.

The aircraft was forced to make an emergency landing in January after instruments indicated there was smoke coming out of the battery. That incident was instrumental in the worldwide grounding of all Boeing Dreamliner jets.

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Dreamliner hitch strikes cars

TOKYO, 29 March 2013: Shares in GS Yuasa, the Japanese battery supplier for Boeing’s troubled Dreamliner, plunged Thursday after its power packs overheated or caught fire in Mitsubishi’s electric and hybrid vehicles.

The stock dropped 11.11% to 392 yen by the close in Tokyo after the automaker said late Wednesday that lithium-ion batteries made by a joint venture including GS Yuasa had suffered malfunctions in at least two instances.

No one was injured in the incidents which involved Mitsubishi’s i-MiEV model, the world’s first mass-produced electric car, and its Outlander PHEV, a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle. Neither of the cars involved had yet been shipped to customers.

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Dreamliner fix still in the air

WASHINGTON, 8 March 2013: The US transportation secretary still has a “lot of questions” about Boeing’s grounded 787 Dreamliner, indicating the aviation giant faces a tough battle to get the planes back in the air soon.

“I have made it very clear that I want a thorough review” of the Boeing plan to fix the plane’s battery system in order to resume commercial flights, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told the Wall Street Journal Wednesday.

“I am going to ask a lot of questions” before a final decision is made, said LaHood, who oversees the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and must sign off on any decision.

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