On Saturday, January 25th, in Everett Washington, the Boeing 777X took its first flight. This marks a monumental milestone in the history of commercial aviation. When the 777X lifted its wheels off of the ground, it became the largest twin jet airliner to ever fly.
After a rough year, Boeing is in dire need of a bounce back from the PR disaster left by the crashes of the 737 MAX in late 2018. With that jet still grounded, Boeing is looking to boost shareholder confidence and reassert the reliability of its products with the introduction of its state-of-the-art 777X.
Set to be delivered sometime in 2021, the newest addition to the 777 family is a behemoth. With a wingspan of over 235 feet, it has the largest wings that Boeing has ever produced and is set to take the market by storm with over 300 orders already placed from airlines including ANA, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Ethiad Airways, and Singapore Airlines.
Emirates Airlines is currently the customer who has ordered the most aircraft, with 126 planes ordered.
The launch customer for this aircraft will be Lufthansa Airlines, who currently has 20 units ordered. Check out this link to visit Boeing’s information page on Lufthansa’s upcoming 777Xs.
Boeing argues that one of the important appeals of this new aircraft is its compatibility with current 777 airport infrastructure. Boeing achieved this by adding foldable winglets to the 777X, which allowed the much larger design to fit into airport gates used by older 777 models. This design feature is clearly meant to be a stab at the A380, the largest commercial airliner in the world, which required millions of dollars in airport infrastructure upgrades to facilitate the massive planes’ needs. Boeing realized this and decided to do its best to maintain cross-model compatibility between the 777 family.
On top of that, this plane has some pretty great engines. The all new GE9X, designed specifically for the 777X, is the largest turbofan engine ever produced, each engine having a diameter of 15 feet. It produces a whopping 105,000 lbf of thrust. Furthermore, by using composite materials, larger fan blades, and higher bypass/compression ratios, the GE9X will likely be 10% more fuel efficient than its predecessor, the GE90.
Note the flat, straight wings, and the lack of winglets
Take notice of the swept wings (reminiscent of the 787)
The new plane will come in two variants; the 777X-8, and the 777X-9. As usual, the balancing game between range and capacity will play out between the two models. The -8 model will have lower passenger capacity but much longer range (384 passengers; 8730 nautical miles), while the -9 will offer a larger capacity for seats, but a shorter range. (426 passengers; 7285 nautical miles).
So will this plane live up to consumers expectations? Will it be as efficient as Boeing advertises? Will airlines be able to sell seats following the disasters of the 737 MAX? We will just have to wait and see.
