Fire on empty Boeing 787
LONDON — A fire aboard an empty 787 at Heathrow Airport spooked Boeing investors Friday, as they feared the re-emergence of battery problems that grounded the plane for months earlier this year. Shares of Boeing, based in Chicago, lost $5.01, or 4.7 percent, to $101.87. At its peak, the selling knocked off $7.89 a share, or $6 billion of market value. The stock recovered slightly as speculation about the cause of the fire shifted away from the batteries. The cause of the fire on the Ethiopian Airlines plane — which broke out more than eight hours after it had landed in London — remained under investigation. The location of the fire led some experts to surmise it wasn’t the plane’s lithium-ion batteries. Meanwhile, an unspecified mechanical issue caused another 787 flown by Thomson Airways to return to Manchester Airport. Runways at Heathrow were shut down for nearly an hour as emergency crews put out the fire. No pas- sengers were on the plane. The 787, which Boeing dubs the Dreamliner, was grounded in January following two incidents with its lithium-ion batteries. One 787 caught fire shortly after it landed at Boston’s Logan Airport on Jan. 7. Boeing has delivered 66 of the planes to customers. Boeing’s stock partially rebounded after photos showed the section of the plane damaged by the fire — an area far away from the battery compartment. “Evidence thus far suggests that the battery was not the cause of the fire at Heathrow,” Jason Gursky, an aerospace analyst with Citi, told investors. “The images out of London are not consistent with the fire at Boston Logan, which prompted the grounding earlier this year.” He added that “aircraft are complex animals such that a fire could come from many places.” He added that this incident could highlight a new problem with the 787, causing further problems for Boeing.