* US investigator to examine battery charger in Arizona
* Other components sent to Seattle, Japan
* Boeing deliveries of 787 on hold
By James Topham and Antoni Slodkowski
TOKYO/WASHINGTON, Jan 20 (Reuters) – The U.S. National
Transportation Safety Board on Sunday ruled out excess voltage
as the cause of a battery fire last month on a Boeing Co
787 Dreamliner jet operated by Japan Airlines Co (JAL)
and widened its investigation to include the Arizona-based
manufacturer of the battery’s charger.
Last week, governments across the world grounded the
Dreamliner while Boeing halted deliveries after a problem with a
lithium-ion battery on a second 787 plane, flown by All Nippon
Airways Co (ANA), forced the aircraft to make an
emergency landing in western Japan.
“Examination of the flight recorder data from the JAL B-787
airplane indicates that the APU (auxiliary power unit) battery
did not exceed its designed voltage of 32 volts,” the NTSB said
in a statement forwarded by a Boeing Japan representative.
On Friday, a Japanese safety official told reporters that
excessive electricity may have overheated the battery in the
ANA-owned Dreamliner that was forced to make the emergency
landing at Japan’s Takamatsu airport last week.
U.S. investigators have examined the lithium-ion battery
that powered the APU, where the battery fire started in the JAL
plane, as well as several other components removed from the
airplane, including wire bundles and battery management circuit
boards, the NTSB statement said.
On Tuesday, the NTSB said U.S. investigators will convene in
Arizona to test and examine the charger for the battery, and
download non-volatile memory from the APU controller, while
other components have been sent for download or examination to
Boeing’s Seattle facility and manufacturer facilities in Japan.
Securaplane Technologies Inc, a unit of Britain’s Meggitt
Plc, on Sunday confirmed that it makes the charger for
lithium-ion batteries used on the 787, and said it will fully
support the U.S. investigation.
Shubhayu Chakraborty, president of Securaplane, declined to
comment on the NTSB’s planned visit, but said his company would
support the investigation.
“At this time we are not really involved in the
investigation. If and when we get involved, we will support it
fully,” he told Reuters.
Securaplane is making a lithium-ion battery system for the
KC-390 military transport plane being built by Brazil’s Embraer
, which is due to have its first plane in 2014.
The company is also developing backup batteries for the
Embraer 450/500 business jet and will make the lithium battery
for the next-generation Eurocopter EC-135 helicopter being
developed by EADS, according to the company’s website.
Japan’s GS Yuasa Corp makes lithium-ion batteries
for the Dreamliner, while France’s Thales produces the
control systems for the battery.
In its statement, the NTSB said French authorities were also
participating in the investigation.
Japan Transport Safety Board said it was aware of the NTSB
report and would consider the U.S. statement in its probe.
The NTSB said the Japanese agency was participating in its
investigation of the Boston incident, while NTSB officials were
helping the agency with its investigation of the emergency
landing in Japan. Both investigations were ongoing.
“There’s nothing more I can add at this point as we still
haven’t started our investigation into the battery here,” JTSB
inspector Hideyo Kosugi told Reuters.
“The NTSB’s investigation started earlier. We still haven’t
taken X-rays or CT-scans of the battery. In our case, both the
battery and the surrounding systems are still stored in
(Tokyo’s) Haneda (Airport) as the third party organization where
the Japanese investigation would take place still has not been
chosen.”
Boeing said on Friday it would continue building the
carbon-composite 787, but put deliveries on hold until the U.S.
Federal Aviation Administration approves and implements a plan
to ensure the safety of potentially flammable lithium-ion
batteries.
In Washington, the top U.S. transportation official Ray
LaHood said the 787, which has a list price of $207 million,
would not fly until regulators were “1,000 percent sure” it was
safe.
Japan is the biggest market so far for the 787, with ANA and
JAL operating 24 of the 290-seat wide-bodied planes. Boeing has
orders for almost 850 of the planes.
