Business

Boeing Max orders fall as customer swaps 737 for Dreamliner

The Boeing logo is seen during the 70th annual International Astronautical Congress at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington last month. Boeing on Monday said it expected the 737 Max airplane, which was grounded after two crashes killed 346 people, to resume flying in January. "In parallel, we are working towards final validation of the updated training requirements, which must occur before the MAX returns to commercial service, and which we now expect to begin in January," Boeing said. | AFP-JIJI

Bloomberg

CHICAGO – Sales for Boeing Co.’s grounded 737 Max slipped in October after a prominent customer converted some of its orders for the narrow-body jet to twin-aisle 787 Dreamliners.

Boeing’s unfilled 737 order backlog, adjusted for accounting considerations, shrank by 19 aircraft during the month to 4,387 jets, the Chicago-based plane-maker revealed on its website Tuesday.

The plane-maker garnered negative 93 orders for the Max, net of cancellations and conversions, through the first 10 months of the year. Sales of the updated 737, the latest generation of a design dating to the mid-1960s, have largely halted since regulators imposed a global flying ban on the jet in March, after two fatal accidents killed 346 people.

Air Lease Corp., the largest publicly traded U.S. aircraft financier, converted 15 of its Max orders to five of the carbon-composite Dreamliner, bolstering sales of the jet, Boeing spokesman Paul Bergman said.

Boeing notched 20 deliveries in October, including 12 Dreamliners and one previous generation 737.