Seattle’s Museum of Flight on Saturday added a Boeing 787 Dreamliner to its outdoor aircraft display.
Boeing donated Dreamliner No. 3, one of the six flight-test airplanes used during 787 certification. Extensive rework on the first three Dreamliners precluded selling the planes.
Boeing Vice President Larry Loftis, who heads the 787 program, and Mike Carriker, chief 787 test pilot, spoke at the ceremony, at which Doug King, president and chief executive of the museum, accepted the airplane.
Dreamliner No. 3 first flew on March 14, 2010.
Boeing in 2009 acknowledged that the first three 787s would have “no commercial value” because of “the inordinate amount of rework and unique and extensive modifications” they required. So for accounting purposes, the company had to write off the $2.5 billion spent in producing those three jets.
Asked if there is any tax deduction for the gift to the museum, a Boeing spokesman declined to comment.
Dreamliner No. 3 flew to 23 countries during a global showcase of the 787 starting in late 2011.
In May 2012, a Seattle Times reporter flew on the plane from Washington, D.C., to Dallas, Texas, to check out the Dreamliner flight experience and described the dramatic flexing of the “sleek-as-scimitar wings” in flight.
The plane was in the museum’s east parking lot all day Sunday.
The plane will be temporarily relocated and closed starting today while it is prepared for permanent exhibition, scheduled to begin Nov. 22.
The 787 exterior is made mostly out of carbon-fiber-reinforced composite plastic. Dreamliner No. 3’s interior will be partially configured as an airliner and partially as a flight-test aircraft.
Also inside, artifacts from the program will be on display covering the development of the 787.
