EPISODE 27
[INTRODUCTION]
[0:00:05.6] IP: On this episode of AvTalk, we welcome back Jon Ostrower to fill us in
on the progress of Boeing's new mid-market airplane, the 10,000th 737 rolls off the production
line and the massive GE9X engine takes to the sky for the first time.
[INTERVIEW]
[0:00:19.6] IP: Hello and welcome to episode 27 of AvTalk; a very special episode, because
it is our one year anniversary of AvTalk.
[0:00:30.0] JR: We now know that we could do 27 episodes in a year.
[0:00:33.9] IP: Well, we can do 26, I guess.
[0:00:37.4] JR: If you want to math it that way, fine.
[0:00:40.3] IP: I'm sorry to rein in your parade.
We did 26 episodes.
This is our 27th episode and we're recording it on the 14th of March, which is the anniversary
on which we released episode one, which was looking back on it, I think we've come a
long way.
[0:00:57.9] JR: We still have no idea what we're doing.
[0:00:59.4] IP: Yes, but now we have no idea what we're doing.
We still have no idea what we're doing, do we?
[0:01:05.3] JR: Nope.
That's it.
That's all we got.
[0:01:07.9] IP: All right.
Well, this was a good episode.
[0:01:09.9] JR: Yeah.
All right.
Close it up.
We're done.
[0:01:13.0] IP: This actually is a big episode.
A lot has happened in the last past couple weeks.
Let's start by saying that we're going to have Jon Ostrower back on the program,
because he knows – every time we talk to him, I realize how little I actually know
about anything.
[0:01:27.6] JR: We know nothing.
[0:01:28.4] IP: How much he knows.
We've asked him back and he agreed.
I don't know why, but he agreed to come back on the program.
We sit down and talk with him for a while and we're going to talk with him about Boeing's
new market airplane, or middle of the market airplane.
[0:01:46.7] JR: Middle of the market.
[0:01:48.0] IP: Or whatever else you want to call it.
Will eventually become what we think is the 797.
Jon learned a lot about that this week, and so we asked him on the program to come talk
about it.
He's going to be on a little bit later.
Some other Boeing news this week, the 10,000th 737 came off the production line.
[0:02:10.8] JR: You're not too happy about it are you?
[0:02:12.5] IP: No, no, no.
I'm very happy.
I have nothing against the 737.
Nothing at all.
[0:02:16.2] JR: However.
[0:02:16.8] IP: However, I think this was a huge, huge missed opportunity on the part
of Southwest Airlines.
Southwest Airlines is taking delivery of N8717M, which is a 737 MAX 8 and it is the 10,000th
737 ever produced.
They built 10,000, well probably more than 10,000 now, but that's number 10,000.
It looks like a 737 in Southwest Liberty.
I am thoroughly disappointed, thoroughly disappointed.
There is no special anything about it on the outset.
You would have no idea.
[0:02:55.4] JR: When it came from aerospace, it's just one of the green bodies that it
was being transported from what?
Kansas, I think it is, up to Kansas, up to Seattle.
It actually did have a little 10,000th logo on it.
It had more celebratory whatever on it, while it wasn't even actually built then when
Southwest took delivery of it.
[0:03:19.8] IP: There is no way to know looking at the airplane.
Even the 9,000th 737 that was delivered to do you know who offhand?
[0:03:28.5] JR: I'll say Lion Air.
[0:03:31.4] IP: No.
The answer is China United Airlines.
They for 9,000 they put a little 9,000 logo between the R1 door and the flight deck window.
Even they did some for 9,000.
What about 8,000?
Let's see.
[0:03:45.5] JR: Norwegian took –
[0:03:46.3] IP: 8,000.
That one's United.
I think even – I don't think so, but 8,000 isn't exactly as tremendous as 10,000.
[0:03:56.8] JR: 6,000 Norwegian did.
[0:03:59.5] IP: I'm sorry.
United did put a – celebrating the 8,000th 737 on the boarding door.
Come on Southwest.
Come on.
[0:04:07.6] JR: I feel like a big missed opportunity.
[0:04:09.4] IP: There is time for them to fix it when Lufthansa took their first A320neo,
they didn't do a damn thing with it.
No logo, no celebration, nothing.
I think they took a bit of heat about that and later down the road, they applied some
stickers or paint on it and said, "Hey, A320neo.
Yay."
Southwest can still salvage this egregious mistake.
[0:04:32.4] JR: What I will assume is that they're going to add it after they take
delivery.
They're waiting to take delivery of the aircraft until they add a special touch to
it.
That's what I'll delude myself into believing, but let's step all that aside and let's
just talk about the fact that Boeing has built 10,000 737s.
[0:04:54.3] IP: I'll be on two in the next week.
Only a few more to go until you've ridden them all.
[0:05:01.1] JR: Yeah.
I mean, I have some others in the past, but 10,000 is a –
[0:05:07.3] IP: I had never thought about this before, but there's got to be – there's
one person on the face of the planet who has flown the most 737s.
[0:05:14.4] JR: Not me.
[0:05:15.4] IP: Not me either.
[0:05:16.2] JR: I'll be flying in economy, so I don't want to fly that amount of 737s,
but somebody must have several thousand probably.
[0:05:24.8] IP: There's got to be somebody out there who – Yeah, I don't know.
I mean, I don't know how we would find that out, but that would be amazing to find out.
What amaze me about all of this is two kind of facts when I was looking into this.
The first is that it took Boeing basically 40 years to build 5,000.
Then it took them 12 years to build another 5,000.
[0:05:49.1] JR: They turned it up to 11.
[0:05:50.5] IP: It's going to take them – I mean, assuming they build another 5,000
which at this rate, who knows.
They're still increasing the production rate, which is crazy to me.
[0:06:00.1] JR: That people want to buy them.
They keep making them.
[0:06:02.6] IP: Yeah.
The other thing that – I looked up the stats in our database and we've tracked nearly
7,000 in the past 30 days.
[0:06:12.5] JR: Nearly 70-ish percent of 737 ever built or so flying.
[0:06:17.4] IP: Active years.
I mean, the oldest one – I'm spot-checking the other day was built in 1978.
[0:06:24.5] JR: Who that belong to?
[0:06:25.4] IP: I believe it was Nolan Air.
It was up in Canada.
It was one of the – there is a couple operators in Canada that use 737 200s.
[0:06:37.4] JR: Yeah.
Air Canadian North, Air North, I think.
Punch up there.
[0:06:40.7] IP: It was one of those and it was built in I think March 1978.
I thought was pretty cool.
The other Boeing-related milestone is a General Electric milestone, today in fact.
No, yesterday the first flight of the GE9X, which will fly in the Boeing 777X.
This thing is big.
[0:07:04.9] JR: Freaking monster.
I got some pictures from GE Aviation today, because I asked very, very nicely and they
were – I would just love to send me some.
They had to upgrade their 747 100 to a 400 and they ordered just to fit this damn thing
under the wing.
The GE9X engine next to the traditional 747 400 engine makes it look like a toy.
It's absolute great with this thing onsite.
[0:07:34.2] IP: I think GE posted, "First flight.
Yay."
I want to say 50% of the comments in reply to the tweet were like, "Is this Photoshopped?"
Because it just looks –
[0:07:43.6] JR: No.
It's real.
[0:07:44.5] IP: It just looks so huge.
Is it a 130 –
[0:07:50.0] JR: The diameter of this engine is 134 inches.
[0:07:55.2] IP: To context the GE90115B, the next biggest is what?
128 inches.
I mean, it's even bigger than that.
It looks massive.
[0:08:08.9] JR: It's pretty ridiculous.
I'm trying to look real quick what the fuselage diameter of the 737 is.
They're about the same size, I think.
[0:08:16.2] IP: Yeah.
I mean, of the GE90, I want to say.
You can almost fit the 737 through the GE90.
I don't know the GE9X, it's got to be – it's even bigger.
[0:08:29.9] JR: Yeah, the GE9X is indeed wider than a 737 fuselage.
You can fit a 737 inside of the GE9X engine, which is preposterous.
[0:08:41.8] IP: It's so big.
We'll put a picture in the show notes, so that you can all marvel along with us.
[0:08:51.0] JR: We swear.
It's real.
It's not Photoshopped.
[0:08:53.5] IP: No.
It's just fantastic.
They retired earlier, or late last year they retired the 747100, which at the time was
the oldest 747 in operation.
Then the 747400 had to undergo – as I understand that they underwent – it underwent modification
to be able to accept the GE9X, which is just – it's crazy to me how big and heavy this
thing is.
[0:09:21.4] JR: It's not the only massive engine that's been tested on weird aircraft.
For the A380 Air Bus tested that engine on, I believe an A340300, which if anyone knows
anything about that, or perhaps those engines are particularly tiny.
Anytime you see these engine test beds, it just doesn't look right.
[0:09:40.7] IP: All of the engine test beds have this weird – like Honeywell has the
–
[0:09:45.7] JR: 75.
[0:09:46.2] IP: I don't even know what they call it, but it's like a protrusion out
of the right side of the fuselage.
[0:09:54.1] JR: Yeah, I think this has like a pylon sticking out the –
[0:09:56.2] IP: Yeah, pylon there we go.
They can mount engines to.
The test that they can do with one end, it's really incredible.
I still can't get over how big the thing is.
I guess, we can move on from there.
[0:10:11.9] JR: We can indeed.
[0:10:13.3] IP: Should we talk about some things that we talked about in previous episodes
and just do a quick update there?
One of the first was that preliminary port from the UA1175 event incident came out.
[0:10:28.9] JR: That was the 777 that shed a good chunk of its engine just outside Hawaii.
The best one.
[0:10:33.6] IP: Right.
Not much to report, because it's a preliminary report.
All we really know is what happened, not why it happened or anything like that.
The 777 experience and in-flight separation of a fan blade and the subsequent loss of
the inlet and fan cowls on the right engine.
The beginning of the incident was an in-flight separation of the fan blade, which is when
it initially happened before we saw any pictures from the front, it just looked like it had
lost a cowling.
The report confirmed some of the photos that we saw afterwards showed that it was missing
a fan blade.
That's a preliminary report.
Somebody commented and posted this.
Somebody commented and noticed, that's not exciting or fun or anything.
It's a preliminary NSTB report.
It's not supposed to be exciting.
[0:11:25.8] JR: Right.
Check back in 12 to 24 months.
[0:11:28.4] IP: You'll get a whole lot more information.
Yeah, that was – I thought that was a very interesting comment and I didn't know what
to say about that.
Should we take a quick break and then bring in Jon?
[0:11:40.3] JR: Yeah, it's time to get schooled on all things middle-market.
[0:11:43.2] IP: There you go.
We will do that.
We will take a quick break and we'll bring in Jon Ostrower to talk about Boeing's new
market airplane.
Stay with us.
[INTERVIEW]
[0:12:01.4] IP: We welcome back to the program Jon Ostrower, aerospace journalist, formerly
with CNN, Wall Street Journal, Flight Global and just an all-around person who knows a
lot about airplanes.
That's why we brought him back, because we've got a new airplane to talk about.
Jon, welcome back to the program.
[0:12:19.4] JR: Welcome back, Jon.
[0:12:20.3] JO: Thank you for having me.
[0:12:21.9] IP: The new airplane that we have to talk about is actually at this point called
the new middle-market airplane.
Jon, can you tell us what this is all about?
[0:12:31.5] JO: Sure.
The new middle-market airplane is the remarkably dry aerospace industry acronym NMA for what
will probably eventually become the Boeing 797, the first only rare planes and it's
Boeing finished the 87 in 2011.
It is going to occupy a space theoretically in between the 787-8, which is about 240 something
passengers flying about 7,000 nautical miles.
The recently launched 737 MAX10, which is about 230 something seats, flying transcon
US routes.
There is a hole in between those two airplanes and Boeing wants to fill it with the NMA.
Ultimately, they are trying to figure out what the business case for that airplane is,
what's the market for it.
Who wants it?
How do we build it?
Where do we build it?
More importantly, how do we make our money back on a new aircraft program in a profile
that is radically different than how it went down?
[0:13:38.9] IP: I feel like the big US airlines are clamoring for this thing and they have
been for years.
American Delta, United, they all operated pretty sizeable 757 fleets, but they're
all aging, they're 20 plus years old.
A lot of them are actually quite old.
They all really – they want this replacement.
What has taken Boeing so long to prove the use case, I guess?
[0:14:03.8] JO: This all kind of, was really born from how do we replace the 757?
That's a discussion that's been going on for a very, very, very long time.
The 757 was sunsetted in the early 2000s, mid-2000s after 9/11 and demand really dried
up for the airplane.
That was a function with few different things, but mostly a lot of that was also Boeing's
strong desire to build the 737NG backlog and really bolster that fleet while still having
a ton of 757s in service.
The need for a clean replacement, so to speak, an airplane that could the 757 mission in
the same way that a 757 operated really wasn't that high.
We saw what airlines wanted as far as seat count.
We saw the 900ER.
Now we see the MAX9, which is going to be delivered later in March for the first time
and with other MAX10, which will be here in 2020.
What ended up happening was Boeing goes and starts this conversation with airlines saying,
"Hey, what do you need?"
What Boeing is always been remarkably good at is figuring out what customers want.
The problem is Boeing has also been remarkably bad at depending on how you want to look at
it, is also saying no to customers.
Because when customers want the world, you tend to get features on an airplane that might
be more expensive to develop.
I would probably point to the day on the 787 and make your door – floor warmers on the
87 also.
I mean, there are a lot of little things that will crop up in terms of what the airlines
want that from a development-cost perspective may make a customer very happy, but they tend
to be very, very expensive when you talk about a massively integrated airplane.
You balance those two requirements.
What the NMA has become is not really a 757 replacement.
It's actually more of an airplane that sits somewhere in between the 767 200, the 757
200, 767 300 and 757 300 also.
A mash-up of those airplanes, but with a range that isn't quite as far as the 767.
Sorry, actually late model 767.
Actually, just as a really quick historical aside, I went back and looked at what the
original range expectations were for the 767 200 and then effectively was New York to LA.
It was a 25, 2600 nautical mile airplane.
It eventually grew to 6000 nautical miles over time just through incremental updates
and pitching you as improvement.
It's interesting when you think about where that airplane began and where it ended up.
This is an airplane that sits theoretically with Boeing as said publicly, 225 seats at
5,000 nautical miles.
That's about 10 hours of flying, but notionally that would give you a lot of flexibility in
terms of the US to Europe, North America to South America, deep in South America, Europe
to Asia, Asia to Australia.
You see a lot of different route structures that can be created or exploited around that.
Not to mention the fact that you also have on the upper end a larger NMA, which would
be about 265, 268 seats and a two-class configuration about 500 miles shorter.
It's a 4500 mile.
That would probably be the big transcon hauler potentially, or your Beijing to Shanghai,
or Guangzhou shuttle that really just needs to move a lot of people in a short distance.
Whether or not that – is that five hours, is that eight, that's obviously for the
airlines to decide.
It's really congested Chinese roots.
It's New York to LA.
We saw La Guardia twin aisle operations.
I mean, that's a good example of what we're notionally going to see this airplane do in
terms of what its ability to go in and out of La Guardia, back and forth to Florida and
so on and so forth.
You can see the large array of roots being created, or being exploited, I should say,
as a result of having an airplane that can do this 757 very versatile mission, but also
long range with a significant passenger count.
It really is this hybrid between a larger twin aisle aircraft and operations that are
largely served by single aisle aircraft today.
It really becomes a mash-up of different capabilities.
[0:19:07.7] JR: Speaking of mash-up, I'm taking a look at the – I guess, the diagram
that you have up on your blog right now.
It looks like a Frankenstein plane right now.
You have the 75, 76, 777 windscreen, you have the 76 200 small twin boarding doors, the
787-style windows, the tail cone of a 737 MAX and the wings look really like a 787.
It seems like Boeing is just taking all the best parts from all its prior generation aircraft
and thrown it together as one?
[0:19:41.3] JO: That's a good way to think about it.
It's worth noting that while this – as far as where the origins of this diagram and
it is a Boeing-created diagram.
It's effectively a vehicle by which they've used and will continue to use to speak to
customers about what they're thinking.
It's not necessarily the final – it's definitely not the final form of the airplane.
It's probably not even the interim form of the airplane, but it gives a sense of a
vehicle for discussion around what the enablers and efficiency might be and what the notional
attributes of the airplane are.
It's more about the pieces of this that give a clue, rather than the entire shape
of it.
Everyone is like, "It's just the 757.
757, that's so boring.
We've done that.
It's still generic."
Okay, fine, yes, people are going to react the way they're going to react, but at the
same time it's also not – it's worth taking a lot of it with a very large grain
of salt, but it does tell us a lot about how Boeing is thinking, about what this airplane
is going to be.
[0:20:44.6] JR: It definitely looks like something new.
This blog post definitely changed my mind that it is not just a straight up 757 replacements,
or God forbid an even larger 737 MAX.
It truly is something unique and filling a gap that does not exist today.
[0:21:00.5] JO: Exactly.
Exactly.
The question is, we're talking about an airplane that will be here in really no earlier
than 2025, because a lot of it is paced by development on the engine side of it and what
GE, Rolls and Pratt can do and when they can do it.
Within that, a lot is going to happen between now and then.
A lot of the closure of the business case is dependent on establishing – just how
big the market for an airplane this size really is.
One of the big factors, because we are still sitting here seven years to go, a lot of those
factors come down to how many airplanes – is Airbus going to produce in roughly in the
lower end of this category, namely the A321neo LR, which is going to fill a lot of the market
for this.
One customer put it to me this way.
They're saying there are going to be thousands of these things out there by the time this
airplane shows up.
What is not only the addressable market, but what is the available market come 2025.
That's going to be an interesting question, because you got the replacement of the 757
fleet, you've got older 737 900 yards that are going to be need replacing.
You see the dynamics shaping up here, but the timing of that and the size of that market
is going to drive a lot of how Boeing approaches this.
I think the one thing – while Boeing says, "Oh, we haven't made any decisions about
this.
We haven't made a decision about this," there is clearly a very, very large team at
Boeing working on this.
This is not a science experiment in the product development space.
This is very much, how do we make this work?
Usually when Boeing goes and tries to answer how do we make this work, and which by the
way is not a step they ever got to in 2011 when they were debating between replacing
the 737 and doing the MAX.
It is a fully-formed unit that is trying to answer this question.
Typically when Boeing goes out and goes to say, "Hey, we want to answer a question,"
typically they do it.
It clearly – this is at a increasingly advance stage, where customers are saying, "I want
to be first.
I want this.
This is how I theoretically reduce it.
This is why it's attractive."
Then you get the engine guys in the mix and you see things started to take shape.
The existence of this image, the existence of these type of features tell us that Boeing
is thinking very, very, very seriously about doing an all-new airplane and beginning to
take options off of the table.
Not bringing back the 57, not re-winging the 67, not re-engine the 67.
How do you get to that endgame?
This seems to be back to Boeing's DNA of wanting to do new airplanes.
This is their next moon shot, despite having declared no more moon shots.
They're back to the moon shot age full force.
[0:24:19.7] IP: You mentioned GE, Rolls and Pratt.
Have they given any indication of their interest in – I mean, would there be some sort of
competition?
Would this be something that there is multiple engine options?
Have they given any indication of what that engine might be?
Would it be a new engine, or are we looking at something incremental that would fit this
flight profile?
[0:24:45.7] JO: Well, a lot of whether or not – it's going to have at least one
engine, at least one engine supply.
We know that, we know that.
That's fair.
That we can say that dependently.
Everything that's out there suggest there's not going to be three, because customers don't
really want that Boeing, doesn't want that complexity.
It's really between two and one.
The question between two and one really comes down to the size of the market.
Again, it comes back to what's the addressable, what's the available size of the market
and how do the three major engine manufacturers answer that question.
Pratt so far has said, we would do a scaled up GTF.
Looking at anywhere from what I understand to be around 45 to as high as 50,000 pounds
of thrust, GE would do something through CFM and that would be essentially a hybrid of
everything, all the technologies going into the GENX and everything that's in the leap
and a mash-up of new technologies, likely conventional architecture.
Yeah, that would be where they would bring an evolved version for that market.
Rolls said they probably want to do a year.
They almost certainly going to do a year for this engine, but again, this is – they're
the pacing on this.
Boeing would love this thing ready by 2024, but it isn't going to go anywhere unless
you have an engine.
That is going to be driving – that's going to be driving the timelines on this.
The engine makers are pretty uncomfortable with really anything before 2025, as far as
a new centerline engine family and what that could mean.
[0:26:29.2] JR: We have an idea of what Boeing wants to do, what they may do, what their
business case may be.
What do you see happening from Airbus?
We have some concept of what they want to do, but why don't you tell us more?
[0:26:43.4] JO: What Airbus wants to do, I mean, the A321 LR is the most obvious starting
point.
That's going to be a vehicle for essentially holding the line on the lower end of the middle
– the lower side of the middle of the market.
Boeing's as well.
The twin can do a whole heck of a lot more and it's more comfortable and so on and
so forth.
Ultimately, Airbus has the option depending on what Boeing does.
Again, that's pacing everything at this point.
To essentially A310Is, so to speak, the 350.
Take that 9 abreast fuselage, shrink it down, exactly how many people it would hold isn't
really because Airbus historically has wanted to – or Airbus Boeing have certainly wanted
to leapfrog each other in segments.
Do you go bigger than 265 to essentially get the benefit of greater seat mile cost, because
you've got more seats.
The same way that Boeing went for the 7779X over the A350 1000 having more seats, a lot
of the claimed efficiency benefits that Boeing points to, a lot of that leases in part a
function of that, that it just carries more people.
Airlines will play with that dividing by the number of seats as a means of increasing virtually
the efficiency of an aircraft relative to another.
Obviously, there is a revenue potential there that comes along with that, so it all balances
out.
At the same time, exactly where this notional A360, or whatever we want to call it.
Again, it doesn't have a name at the moment.
Whatever this notionally study looks like would effectively aim to hit and respond to
the NMA with a 321 plus or 322 or something, and then on the upper end effectively a new
twin aisle design that would take the best elements of the 350 cabin, but with a new
more optimized wing for shorter flights and an engine theoretically that could significantly
improve the business case for any aircraft manufacturer if they get to use it also, if
the engine is also developed for the NMA.
It could be an interesting – actually, I can tell you it will be an interesting situation
to watch unfold, as far as how Airbus responds to this.
Again, we're talking about airplanes that are probably at the minimum seven, eight,
nine, 10 years out.
That's a crazy thought sitting here in 2018.
[0:29:30.0] JR: Yeah, we're talking a decade out and we haven't even taken to new account
what China might be doing, or what Russia might be doing since we've talked about
them in the past.
They also have some similar very interesting things coming out in that timeframe.
[0:29:42.6] JO: Absolutely.
Absolutely.
The CR929, which is the Chinese-Russian collaboration is effectively creating a 330, 350, 787 category
airplane.
Whether it's composite, whether it's aluminum, that's not quite clear.
I mean, the comeback research and development folks showed off a composite panel that they
made that would theoretically be for the airplane.
No one is really sure whether or not that's going to be the final form, because the reality
is composites are really, really, really expensive.
That is still a big portion of why the 87 was expensive as it was and why the 350 is
as expensive as it is.
From what I understand, it's about twice as expensive as aluminum based on at the same
point.
The benefits have to outweigh the cost here, and which also ultimately brings us back to
the NMA, which is, is it composite?
Is it aluminum?
What did shape?
How do you make that work?
Can you do it in aluminum and can you do it in composite?
There are a lot of interesting features of this airplane that are going to test technologies
that really are going to significantly shift how, if they're successful, significantly
shift how airplanes are manufactured and what the capabilities for airplane makers to really
shape metal and composite in a way that gets them what they want.
[0:31:13.2] JR: Where do you think Boeing would even build this?
Renton is maxed out with the 737 program.
Could it be –
[0:31:19.8] JO: I see what you did there.
I see what you did there.
[0:31:22.5] JR: Get it.
Do you seem doing this possibly up in South Carolina, or are sticking up in Everett?
[0:31:27.3] JO: That's a great question.
I think, the one thing that's clear at this point is that Boeing wants to make that decision
a lot earlier than they usually do.
Typically they launch a program and then sometime significantly at a later point, not that much
at a later point, but that where it's built and launching it have been increasingly tied.
I mean, when the 777X launched, there were still an outstanding question about where
the airplane was going to be built and where that wing was going to be built.
That didn't come until about early 2014.
Boeing wanted them together, so I think that was probably a good indication of how they're
thinking about the manufacturing of their new airplanes.
I think we're probably when we get a launch of this airplane, we're probably going to
get an answer as to where it's going to be built.
Realistically, when you think about the priorities that Boeing has identified, as far as keeping
the development cost of this airplane low, setting up a new Greenfield site, or significantly
building new manufacturing infrastructure at an existing site is probably not going
to help the business case, as far as the amount of money you're going to spend.
How you keep that as low as possible is going to be a combination of, well notionally a
couple different things.
One of the incentives you get from any given municipality or state to build there, or what
do you do with a existing infrastructure.
You've got 747 continuing on for the time being as a freighter with the help of UPS.
You've got the 87 occupying a spot in Everett, and heck, I don't get the sense that Boeing
wants to earmark Renton for anything other than 737 mass production right now, because
the pressure at least notionally is to go even higher than 57 a month in 2019.
Finding space for that is probably going to be the higher priority, rather than bringing
in a twin aisle aircraft.
Theoretically, it's really between Everett and St. Louis and Charleston; some horse race
they're in.
There are various permutations that have been discussed about what might happen, where that
might go, but that's going to be a big question that's probably going to get answered in
the not too distant future depending on what individual strategies are and what packages
of incentives are assembled to have Boeing build their airplane there.
[0:34:01.8] IP: I want to take a step back, because part of the conversation around the
new airplane that's interested is the push and pull between – you mentioned earlier
that Boeing tries to make customers happy, sometimes to a fault with heated flooring
and days and things like that.
Somewhere where it really matters is the shape of the plane's, we'll call it belly.
That's been a Julie Johnson at Bloomberg wrote a pretty good article on detailing this
a little bit.
I wanted to get a new discussion about why the shape of the aircraft, not just the wings,
not just the engines matters.
Jon, if you could detail for us what the difference might be and why that matters.
[0:34:41.6] JO: Yeah, absolutely.
Notionally, the NMA is a twin aisle aircraft.
Twin aisle aircraft historically are very expensive to build.
They're expensive to build because they at a really obvious point, they just require
more material.
The cost per pound of the aircraft is just higher.
It's not necessarily a clean – if cost per pound on a single aisle is X, well it's
not some – you just don't take that and multiply it by however much bigger the airplane
is.
I mean, like you size up like that, everything gets heavier, everything gets beefier, the
requirements are increased in terms of wing sizing and thrust and all the different pieces
that come along with that.
When Boeing talks about this airplane, they talk about – what their line is – let's
see if I can remember.
It's twin-aisle comfort and single-aisle economics, which is another way of saying
in practical terms, above the floor it would be a twin-aisle aircraft and below the floor,
it will be a single-aisle aircraft capable of carrying a containerized cargo, and for
bags like the 320 family.
The problem with that is when the shape is a perfect oval, the way the pressure and the
loads press on the outside of the aircraft, hasn't been explained to me and I will probably
butcher this, because I'm again not an engineer, is that it applies evenly against the bubble;
the circular shape of the fuselage.
We've seen what's called a double bubble fuselage, which is very, very common in the
industry.
We saw it in most extreme way on the Stratocruiser with that huge boldness upper deck and a lower
deck that's another bubble.
Again, as long as the floor is at the meeting point of those two, the loads on the frames
and the fuselage skin are all even.
The problem is to do that for an NMA, it doesn't quite work, because having a shape that is
– think of it like a sea shell with a lower – smaller bottom portion and a big boldest
top portion.
Well, you're just actually dealing with an O-void shape at that point and you're
getting – it's not a double bubble anymore.
The way the loads and the pressures and all the stresses are distributed along the lower
lobe, which isn't necessarily a bubble, that's when it really, really gets challenging
and you get an uneven distribution of the loads.
That can be remarkably challenging as far as dealing with the stress on the airplane
and how that's all distributed.
That's a remarkably probably crude way of describing it.
It's openly what Boeing is trying to solve here.
Boeing as far as the way that they talk about it, they believe they figured that out.
What you get is this 1.5X solution, which says, well we've got this twin aisle upper
deck, but we've got this lower deck that isn't essentially a perfect mirror to the
upper deck.
We're not carrying all that extra weight, so we can get the scaled economics of a single-aisle
airplane for airlines.
I mean, certainly the manufacturing processes that come with this are something that Boeing
says that they have figured out.
They haven't said what those are.
They've only just said, they've got it figured it out.
That's their secret sauce right now.
As far as that push and pull from a airline, this is what Julie talked about in her article,
which is excellent, the idea that underneath the floor and this comes back to my earlier
point about not being able to say not to airlines, that carriers in Asia want to carry 10 tons
of cargo in the belly, and US Airlines and European Airlines want to carry 5 tons of
cargo in the belly.
To some extent, that will dictate the shape of what goes underneath the floor.
However, volumetrically 5 tons and 10 tons can take very different shapes.
I think a lot of the discussion around this is how do you size the wing, how do you size
the thrust of the engine to be able to efficiently carry 5 or 10 tons of cargo.
What do you optimize around?
The push-pull is if A321 with 97 of the 97-ton maximum takeoff weight, so 321 LR can carry
5 tons of cargo, wouldn't you want a product that differentiates itself at 10 tons of cargo?
Maybe the answer is yes.
Maybe it's no.
Again, it comes back to the ability of not letting this creep up into the small 787 category
when you've got airlines like Norwegian who are ready to buy a bunch of them saying,
"Well, cargo doesn't really matter."
For the Asian airlines, the priorities are different.
It's really going to be about how Boeing balance that requirement, but also not letting
the mission creep up to a point where every time you add more capability to you plane,
you're also adding more cost.
Being able to say, "No, this airplane is this.
If you want an airplane that can carry a lot of cargo, we have a 787 for you," and say
we've got a product there, but this is not that.
That might artificially limit the size of the market, but is there a tradeoff with how
much it's going to cost in the pace of that return?
Again, I don't envy Boeing, but this is the stuff that they love doing.
They love figuring out how to make new airplanes and their business models work.
As I'm comfortable as that can be sometimes, this is what fundamentally they love doing
and this is in their DNA.
I mean, creating new high-performance aircraft is what Boeing loves to do.
It's expensive and it's getting more expensive, which is a totally separate strategic discussion
about the future of the aerospace industry.
Fundamentally, Boeing right now is in their element, as far as where they like to be thinking
about new products.
[0:41:16.8] IP: I think that we should leave it there, because anything else we discuss
is just going to be so far into the future that I'm not sure it's worth getting so
far into the weeds.
I think we've got a good basis for understanding the news that comes after this.
Jon, I know you're going to be following this I think very closely is putting it lightly.
If there is more firm news, we'd love to have you back to discuss where the airplane
is headed and what it's going to maybe look like in its intermediate stage.
[0:41:50.1] JO: I would love that.
Count me in.
[0:41:51.8] IP: Jon, thanks so much for joining us.
We've been talking with Jon Ostrower.
You can find him on Twitter @jonostrower, J-O-N-O-S-T-R-O-W-E-R and jonostrower.com
is his blog.
Go check out, we'll put a link on the show notes to check out his fantastic article complete
with annotated diagrams of the new NMA concept.
Jon, thanks so much for joining us.
Really appreciate it.
[0:42:17.9] JO: My pleasure.
Thanks for having me.
[0:42:19.7] JR: Thanks a lot Jon.
[END OF INTERVIEW]
[0:42:28.7] IP: We are back from learning more than I ever thought we could learn about
Boeing's new market airplane.
[0:42:36.1] JR: I learned more than anyone should learn at this stage, because we still
don't know much, do we?
[0:42:42.0] IP: No.
It's crazy to think that these things – we're talking about something now and then in what,
seven, eight years, we'll see it fly for the first time.
[0:42:55.0] JR: Give or take.
I mean, one though a lot between then and now, but we're – I think we've talked
about this with Jon in the past, but we're in that drought stage where nothing new is
going to be taken to the sky anytime soon.
As he also said today, don't think about how old you'll be by the time we get this
middle or market aircraft in the air, because you won't like the math you do.
[0:43:17.0] IP: Yeah.
Well, leave that one just as it is.
Let's discuss a few recent crashes, because there have been a couple in the past couple
weeks that went into – let's see, we had The Challenger in Iran that was flying from
Dubai up to Turkey.
There was the dash 8 Napol that was trying to land in Kathmandu.
Then there was the tourist helicopter in New York, all within the past couple weeks.
I know that statistically, this year is no different than any other year and things are
not – does it feel different?
I don't know.
[0:44:01.8] JR: Yeah.
I mean, the last year I don't think we talked about this topic once, period, because it
did not happen.
I think every episode this year so far we've had to do that unfortunately.
[0:44:16.3] IP: Yeah.
The one thing that I did want to bring up and we brought this up last episode, I think
as well is the MLAT tracking.
Because for each of these, we weren't able to calculate position information, because
it's MLAT, and because of coverage issues and coverage is difficult – MLAT coverage
is difficult in Iran at this point.
It's getting better at something that we're actively working on.
MLAT coverage in the poll is difficult not for lack of receivers, which we have quite
a few, and so high-level altitude MLAT coverage is actually quite good.
It's just that the mountains are so big and the valleys are so low that the radio
signals don't play well with the mountains.
The helicopters, it was a very similar issue because of the canyons its created by the
skyscrapers in New York.
Not able to calculate a position value, but still receiving altitude data, which can tell
a pretty important story in a number of cases, like with the case of the Dash 8 Napol, a
second attempt was made at landing.
A climate altitude and then a decreasing altitude towards the airport again, things like that.
We're not getting as much information as we like from certain aircraft, but the conversation
globally towards ADSB is certainly helping with those issues.
[0:45:51.2] JR: Yeah, seeing more and more helicopters in the New York City area that
actually do have ADSB in this, the helicopter that went down wasn't actually all that
old.
It was five years old, I believe.
I don't think it had ADSB installed.
[0:46:04.6] IP: I can double-check.
No, I don't think it did.
I mean, it's one of the things where ADSB is providing a lot more information than the
older model as transponders, especially in events like this.
Let's turn our attention to Turkey.
[0:46:19.8] JR: Turkey.
I like Turkey.
[0:46:22.0] IP: Turkish Airlines ordered a bunch of more planes –
[0:46:24.3] JR: I thought we're talking about turkey-turkey.
[0:46:26.2] IP: I mean, I suppose we could discuss –
[0:46:28.3] JR: Talking about Turkish, okay.
[0:46:29.7] IP: Turkish, yes.
[0:46:31.3] JR: They ordered more airplanes for their –
[0:46:33.5] IP: What kind?
[0:46:33.9] JR: For their new airport that's opening soon, I guess.
[0:46:36.2] IP: They ordered more airplanes.
[0:46:38.4] JR: Kind of.
They topped up some other orders, I believe and firmed up some orders for 25 Airbus A350
900s and another 25 for the Boeing 787-9.
[0:46:51.3] IP: Well, there you go then.
[0:46:51.3] JR: They're taking delivery between 2019 and 2023.
Playing the long game here, but got to fill up the gates of that new airport with something.
[0:47:00.9] IP: When is that airport open?
[0:47:02.6] JR: Soon I think.
[0:47:03.8] IP: Are we going?
[0:47:04.6] JR: No.
[0:47:05.0] IP: Okay.
[0:47:05.5] JR: Wait.
Are Americans allowed back in Turkey now?
[0:47:08.2] IP: I think we're allowed back in, but we can double check.
[0:47:11.6] JR: That's good.
Okay, so it's soon.
Opened construction started May 2015.
October 2018 is the commercial operations start date.
With all new airports, take that with a grain of salt because –
[0:47:29.3] IP: Berlin, excuse me.
[0:47:31.5] JR: Yeah.
Maybe October 2018.
Maybe things go Berlin, maybe sometime never.
[0:47:38.6] IP: If things go Berlin.
I love it.
[0:47:41.4] JR: Yeah.
That stupid airport might never open.
[0:47:44.0] IP: I'm bringing that one into a phrase.
[0:47:47.5] JR: Well, Wikipedia says highest of all sources here as of March 2018, around
80% of the construction was complete.
Not great plan.
Test operations did not take place by February 26th as planned, so who knows.
[0:48:01.7] IP: Who knows.
Let's stick with Berlin and pulling a Berlin.
The AN225 is going to fly again soon, maybe, we think.
[0:48:13.9] JR: Can you please come to the US.
[0:48:14.9] IP: It is not coming to the US.
[0:48:16.7] JR: Whatever.
[0:48:18.2] IP: Probably.
I mean, we just need to start a mining company in order – some giant piece of mining equipment
and have it delivered to – [0:48:24.2] JR: I'm on it.
[0:48:25.2] IP: JFK or something.
You get on that and get back to me when it's done.
[0:48:29.2] JR: What would I mine for New York?
We don't have much here.
[0:48:32.2] IP: Subway tokens?
[0:48:33.6] JR: Yeah.
Okay.
I can do that.
We live right on top of the subway, so why not.
[0:48:37.0] IP: There you go.
Problem solved.
The plan was for the AN225 to go to Berlin, which is how I managed that segway somehow.
That plan got changed.
It's now going to got Leipzig, then to Ankara and Dammam in Saudi Arabia and drop off whatever
it's carrying.
Not sure.
That was supposed to happen the 27th of March.
It looks like that's changing.
We're not sure with the exactly schedule is yet.
Stay tuned, because it looks like it's going to fly and it looks like it's going to fly
soon and it's always amazing to watch that thing just, I don't know, do its thing.
[0:49:19.4] JR: If anyone's forgotten, this is the gigantic turbo – the world's largest
turbo prop –
[0:49:25.8] IP: No, no.
This is the 225.
This is –
[0:49:27.4] JR: The 225.
[0:49:28.4] IP: Yeah, this is the mirror.
This is the big one, the biggest one.
[0:49:32.5] JR: You can tell how well I'm paying attention.
[0:49:35.7] IP: I always appreciate that.
[0:49:38.5] JR: Let those come to the US every now and then.
[0:49:41.1] IP: Yeah, it does.
It does.
[0:49:42.0] JR: I thought we were talking about the – what's it called?
The AN –
[0:49:46.4] IP: The 22.
[0:49:47.8] JR: 22.
Yeah, that thing.
[0:49:48.4] IP: Which is the world's largest turbo prop, which will probably never come
to the US, unless you politely request that it does so and pay for it.
We could start a Kickstarter, or something or something to – I don't know how many
people would pay into that.
[0:50:04.3] JR: One giant turbo prop, please.
[0:50:07.3] IP: Bring it over empty.
Let us take some pictures, take some video and head home.
[0:50:10.9] JR: Done.
[0:50:12.0] IP: Oh, well.
Yeah, so the AN225 it's the six-engine behemoth, which was originally designed to carry the
Soviet space shuttle and now carries, well basically large mining equipment.
[0:50:29.9] JR: Stuff.
[0:50:31.4] IP: I feel like every time we know what's inside of it, it's mining
equipment.
[0:50:34.9] JR: It's generators and mining equipment.
Yeah.
[0:50:37.6] IP: Stuff that's extremely heavy and extremely long and needs a giant airplane
to move it around.
It will hopefully fly at the end of the month.
We'll keep you posted.
We've got a blogpost going that we're updating with the schedule as it is known
to us and hopefully we'll have more information rather soon about when it's actually going
to fly and to confirm up the airports and things like that.
Before we go, we should do a few very quick things such as wish TAP Portugal a 73rd birthday,
because TAP is Jason's favorite airline.
[0:51:15.4] JR: That is incorrect.
Very wrong.
[0:51:18.5] IP: All you ever do is talk about how much you love TAP.
[0:51:21.7] JR: I don't.
I think you're lying.
Not my favorite airline.
[0:51:26.2] IP: For those who don't know, we'll put – I'll link to something.
[0:51:31.2] JR: Does that the link to?
[0:51:32.5] IP: Jason hates TAP.
[0:51:33.9] JR: I don't hate them.
They just screwed me over with no remorse or apology.
No big deal.
[0:51:40.6] IP: Jason dislikes them.
[0:51:41.6] JR: I do.
[0:51:42.4] IP: The other thing is we listen to your feedback.
When you e-mail us, we listen.
A good handful of people e-mailed us about our misquotation of Qantas's plans for its
787s.
Jason, you privately defended yourself to me and I want to give you the opportunity
to publicly say that you are right, even though we were both wrong.
[0:52:05.6] JR: That sounds like something that would happen to us.
Yes, but the 787 is coming to JFK eventually once they move to American terminal 8 in the
following months.
We will get to see that fancy livery out here in New York if it comes there in daylight
hours, that would be wonderful.
I think it does some time, some parts of the year, but not always, but no more 747s in
the near future for us at JFK with Qantas.
[0:52:33.2] IP: We were wrong.
Qantas is bringing the 787 to the US and then on to – through the gateway in Los Angeles
and then onto New York.
Jason will have a chance to see it.
I won't, unless they magically introduce a Sydney or Melbourne-Chicago route, which
–
[0:52:55.0] JR: I'm sure it will snow at JFK one day to Chicago.
[0:52:58.9] IP: Yeah.
Maybe it's possible, but that's pretty much my only chance of seeing it outside of
doing some traveling.
Maybe we'll have to figure out a way to do that.
That is all the corrections we have thankfully from the last episode.
We're light on corrections this time.
[0:53:14.2] JR: That's good.
[0:53:14.8] IP: Not bad, huh?
If we said anything in this episode that is wrong, which is entirely possible, probably
–
[0:53:22.6] JR: The snow.
[0:53:23.8] IP: Probably even let us know at podcast@fr24.com.
We love to hear from you.
If you liked what you heard, e-mail us or go on iTunes and leave a rating and review.
It helps other people find the podcast.
We like talking to more people, so that more people can find the podcast and learn a little
bit about aviation every couple weeks.
We like talking about it and we hope you like listening about it.
If there's anything you want to hear about, also drop us a note, podcast@fr24.com.
Our glossary series continues next time.
Captain Ken Hoke will fill us in on RVSM airspace.
I'm looking forward to that in our next episode.
[0:54:05.2] JR: I still don't know what that – I've even already got the debrief
on it.
[0:54:09.1] IP: Well, then you'll just have to listen to the episode and you'll learn
something.
[0:54:13.2] JR: You know that's not going to happen.
[0:54:14.4] IP: All right.
Episode 27, we've done a full year of these and we're just going to keep going until
someone takes the mics away from us.
I am Ian Petchenik here as always with –
[0:54:26.6] JR: Jason Rabinowitz.
Sincerely, thank you for a year of putting up with our nonsense.
[0:54:33.6] IP: Here's to more nonsense.
[END]
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