EVA Air (BR, Taipei Taoyuan) will acquire another five B787-9s in a direct deal with Boeing (BOE, Washington National), taking the manufacturer's tally of ordered but undelivered B787s to over 600 aircraft.
The Taiwanese carrier already operates four B787-9s and six B787-10s and has a further four B787-9s and seven B787-10s on order with Boeing. The new order takes the future EVA Air B787 fleet size to 26. The airline said deliveries from the latest order would happen between 2025 and 2027. Boeing declined to comment on the order to ch-aviation.
According to ch-aviation schedules data, EVA Air uses its existing B787s to operate scheduled flights from Taipei to Amsterdam Schiphol, Bangkok Suvarnabhumi, Brisbane International, Chengdu Shuangliu, Fukuoka, Hong Kong International, Milan Malpensa, Munich, Osaka Kansai, Seattle Tacoma International, Seoul Incheon, Tokyo Narita, and Vienna. When the deliveries are complete, it is believed the B787-9s will focus on routes to North America and Europe, while the B787-10s will primarily service Asia and Australasia.
Last April, US Senator Lindsey Graham visited Taiwan and reportedly encouraged the country's government and airlines to buy Boeing. In August 2022, EVA Air's local rival China Airlines (CI, Taipei Taoyuan) signed a deal to acquire sixteen B787-9s, with options for another eight.
As of January 31, Boeing had 575 unfulfilled B787s orders. The manufacturer is known to have delivered at least one B787 in February to United Airlines (UA, Chicago O'Hare) in February before deliveries were once again halted on February 23 due to problems with the forward pressure bulkhead. However, since the end of January, in addition to the EVA Air order, Boeing has also signed orders for twenty -9s with Air India (AI, Delhi International) and fifteen -9s with Greater Bay Airlines (HB, Hong Kong International), taking the order backlog to well over 600 aircraft. The manufacturer is expected to resume deliveries of its B787s this week.
