Boeing stock rebounds despite Dreamliner fire at Heathrow Airport
Wall Street seems unfazed by the latest incident to hit Boeing Co.’s 787 Dreamliner. The company’s stock has been trading up all day.
Boeing’s shares were trading up $3.57, or 3.5% to $105.44, recovering much of its loss of nearly 5%, or $5.01, on Friday.
That same day, a 787 that had been sitting at a remote parking stand for more than eight hours at London’s Heathrow Airport caught fire. No one was onboard the Ethiopian Airlines plane and no one was injured, the airline and an airport spokeswoman said.
FULL COVERAGE: Boeing’s troubled Dreamliner
Heathrow closed both of its runways for 90 minutes, delaying flights. Images from the scene showed emergency vehicles with fire-retardant foam sprawled across the ground.
On Saturday, investigators said they no found evidence that the internal fire was linked to problematic aircraft batteries that grounded the worldwide fleet of 787s for nearly four months, Britain’s Air Accidents Investigation Branch said.
In a statement, the agency said that “it is clear that this heat damage is remote from the area in which the aircraft main and APU [Auxiliary Power Unit] batteries are located, and, at this stage, there is no evidence of a direct causal relationship.”
Boeing has hitched its fortunes on the 787, a long-range, wide-body plane considered an engineering marvel. Its carbon-composite exterior and technical designs make it extremely fuel-efficient, an attractive quality for airlines at a time of high fuel prices.
Airlines have ordered 930 Dreamliners, making it one of the most coveted commercial jets. The company has delivered 68 of the jets.
The aerospace giant first hit turbulence in January when federal regulators banned all 787 planes from flying for four months after batteries on two planes overheated, with one catching on fire.
Boeing later ordered modifications to the jets to increase ventilation and insulation near the batteries, but the company and investigators never determined the root cause of the overheating.
During all this time, Boeing stock soared. The Chicago company’s stock is up more than 35% year-to-date.
Ethiopian Airlines became the first carrier to resume flying the aircraft in April. Boeing sped up 787 production in May, hoping to increase monthly deliveries from seven to 10 by the end of the year.
Boeing staff and a U.S. National Transportation Safety Board representative were at Heathrow investigating the incident. The company said in a statement that it is “working to fully understand and address this.”
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