TOKYO -- Japan's All Nippon Airways said it put its Dreamliner
fleet back into service Sunday following a suspension of about four
months due to battery problems.
ANA, the single biggest operator of Boeing Co.'s (BA) flagship
787, said one of the high-tech planes departed "safely" Sunday
afternoon from Sapporo in Hokkaido to Haneda in Tokyo.
It was ANA's first commercial flight of Dreamliners since the
planes were grounded worldwide after two separate incidents on
Japanese-owned planes involving overheating of the lithium-ion
battery packs in January.
Last week ANA announced plans to resume the flights earlier than
its originally planned date of June 1 as the airline completed
safety tests.
After months of investigations, U.S. authorities in April
formally approved Boeing's battery fix and Japanese regulators
followed suit.
In mid-May ANA said a modified Dreamliner had experienced a
fault in an electrical panel earlier in the month. But it insisted
the glitch was too "minor" to affect the restart of services by the
fuel-saving lightweight planes.
ANA operates around a third of the 50 787s that Boeing has
delivered.
Last Monday, United Airlines resumed a Boeing 787 Dreamliner
flight from the airline's hub in Houston, Texas, to Chicago.
26-05-13 0930GMT
