Boeing 787 First Flight Date is Set

Boeing said Thursday evening that the first flight of its 787-8 long-range jet is set for 10 a.m., Dec. 15 in Everett, Wash.

The first of six test airplanes, ZA001, is due to take off from Payne Field next to the airplane's final assembly factory north of Seattle. Chief Pilot Michael H. Carriker and copilot Randall Neville will conduct low- and high-speed taxi tests that take the airplane to the threshold of flight in preparation for Tuesday's events.

Once airborne, Carriker and Neville are not expected to return ZA001 to Everett. They will land at Boeing Field in Seattle, headquarters for all of Boeing's commercial airplane flight tests.

The full flight program is nominally expected to last 8.5 months and follows about three years of pre-flight certification procedures that Boeing has conducted with the FAA.

If the flight schedule holds, FAA certification and delivery of the first production airplane - the seventh produced - to launch customer All Nippon Airways will be achieved late in 2010. But it is an aggressive schedule.