Boeing: KATN

"If it's not Boeing, I'm not going."

-- Mantra from most ALPA members in the 20th Century

Boeing, like many US manufacturers, have come across more than their fair share of roadblocks, union issues, construction problems, competition snags and the like. Once an absolute and undisputed powerhouse in the world of military and commercial aircraft construction, Boeing slipped most recently to second place behind the consortium of Airbus Industries.

Except now. Boeing is back and, as exemplified above, Kicking Ass and Taking Names.

Unlike General Motors, which is bleeding customers and divisions. Recently GM divested and sold its Electo Motive Division which historically brought diesel-electric locomotive manufacturing to unprecedented levels. With the sale of EMD to a third-rate manufacturer, American locomotive construction now gets handed primarily over to General Electric -- a semi-testimony to the supremacy of 4-stroke diesels to 2-stroke diesels. EMD lagged behind, decentralized to Canada and Mexico, kept to its 2-stroke design, limited its model line, and watched as GE took revolutionary technological steps.

Like GM, Delphi entered bankruptcy in October of last year, it being the largest car parts maker in the US. Spun off from GM in 1999, GM is still its biggest customer.

But enough of the bad news.

The good news:

Boeing booked more than a thousand orders for new aircraft in 2005 and is thus certain to outsell Airbus, its European arch-rival, for the first time in years. But both planemakers have reason to celebrate, for now at least, as the airline industry emerges from its post-September 11th slump.

Whereas Airbus is putting a great deal of its thrust into the A380, a double-decker 555-passenger, two-level aircraft requiring its own separate facilities for boarding (due to size), Boeing has decided to go with the 787, a state of the art aircraft which would utilize current airport infrastructure. Some persons are theorizing that, in reality, it would take a minimum of one and possibly two hours for a full passenger manifest to board an Airbus A380.

In my opinion, this does not bode well for an emergency evacuation but, sales and time will tell. One thing is certain: the first A380 to go down will cause an upheaval in the media, the public and in the industry.