Originally published Saturday, June 26, 2010 at 3:32 PM

Two grounded 787s could take off again Sunday

Boeing's 787 Dreamliners, grounded this week for tail inspections, stayed parked Saturday. But the two airplanes scheduled to fly the next flight tests have been cleared to go, and could be back in the air Sunday.

By Seattle Times staff

Boeing's 787 Dreamliners, grounded last week for tail inspections, stayed parked Saturday.

But the two airplanes scheduled to fly the next flight tests have been cleared to go. Managers told their flight-test teams Saturday afternoon to be ready to take those two jets back into the air Sunday.

The groundings came after engineers discovered workmanship flaws in some of the horizontal tails built by Italian 787 partner Alenia.

Altogether, 25 tails will have to be checked — and if the flaw shows up, fixed — but the priority was to get those two planes inspected quickly so that flight tests could resume.

On Sunday, Dreamliner No. 2 is expected to depart Boeing Field, where it has been parked since Wednesday. Dreamliner No. 3, parked in Arizona since Tuesday, is set to fly back to Seattle.

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