EVERETT – The Boeing Co. on Thursday picked up a key order for 767s when Japan Airlines confirmed it was taking six of the Everett-built jets.
Deliveries will begin in 2007 and run through 2008, signaling that after months of speculation that Boeing was ready to shut down the 767 line, it’s now ready to keep it running for at least that long.
“Certainly, we’re good to go for a while,” said Leslie Nichols, a spokeswoman for the 767 program.
JAL, which already operates 37 of the planes and has three more on order, said it is buying three passenger-carrying 767-300ERs and three 767 freighters. The deal is worth about $800 million at list prices, but it’s likely the airline received a discount.
Boeing has been considering for almost a year how much longer it will continue to build the 767. Orders for the plane, which debuted in 1980, have slowed in the face of competition from Airbus’ new A330 and as Boeing works to bring its replacement, the 787, to the market.
Boeing has sought to extend the 767’s life as a military aircraft. But a deal to sell and lease 100 of them to the U.S. Air Force collapsed amid a 2003 Pentagon scandal that sent two company executives to jail and resulted in the resignation of then chief executive Phil Condit.
But in recent months, as Boeing has neared a deadline for deciding the fate of the line, executives have been more upbeat about the 767’s prospects. A rebound in air travel means airlines need more midsized jets sooner than Boeing can deliver 787s to them, and officials have hinted that a number of small-scale orders are in the works.
Thursday’s order gives Boeing 11 767 sales for the year, which means that 2005 is likely to be the best sales year for the plane since 2001, when the company sold 40.
Reporter Bryan Corliss: 425-339-3454 or corliss@heraldnet.com.
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