Dreamliner Down?

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


The Seattle Times has the scoop that the Boeing Dreamliner “may not fly this year.” The problem is pretty serious: its wings don’t attach to its body safely. The New York Times‘ Seattle correspondent, Timothy Egan, explains (in Slate) why this matters:

[A] big story about the future of American industry, such as it is: a Seattle Times story that the 787 Dreamliner may not fly this year and could have serious troubles down the road. The implication is that it may not fly at all. One caveat: My wife works at the Seattle Times, on the editorial side, so this could sound like a homer. But it’s a big deal. Why? With the auto industry in bankruptcy, people oft say: We don’t make anything in this country anymore. In fact, we do. We make airlines for the world, at some of the best wages in the world. If the Dreamliner, Boeing’s next edition, doesn’t fly, it’s a huge blow to American industrial might, or what’s left of it. And it shows, perhaps, that you can’t build a plane by outsourcing all its parts to factories and engineers around the world, as Boeing has tried to do.

Our own Jim Ridgeway has already raised questions about the safety of composite aircraft like the Dreamliner. If Jim’s worst fears about composites are realized, Boeing could be in big trouble.

Fact:

Mother Jones was founded as a nonprofit in 1976 because we knew corporations and billionaires wouldn't fund the type of hard-hitting journalism we set out to do.

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

Fact:

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate