Boeing receives the largest 787 Dreamliner order for Latin America

The Boeing Company announced Monday that Chile's LAN Airlines has ordered 32 Dreamliners, marking the largest 787 acquisition to date for Latin America. The press-release informs that the Santiago-based LAN will buy 26 Dreamliners worth $4.5 billion (£2.2 billion), and will lease an additional six from International Lease Finance Corp.

So far, two other Latin American airlines have committed to the Boeing’s Dreamliner – Aeromexico, with two purchased and three leased, and Columbia’s Avianca, which has ordered 10.

Boeing said last month it would delay the launch of its first 787 Dreamliner by six months to late 2008 because of assembly problems. Thus far, Boeing has received a total of 736 orders for the new aircraft from 51 airlines worldwide.

First commercial A380 flight set for October 25

The first commercial flight on the new Airbus A380 aircraft has been scheduled for October 25, 2007. The first carrier to fly the super-jumbo will be Singapore Airlines. Flight SQ380 will depart Singapore for Sydney and it will seat 471 passengers in three classes. The airline’s first of 19 ordered A380s is starting services 10 days after it takes delivery. So far, as much as fourteen airlines, including Emirates, Qatar Airways, Virgin, Air France and Qantas, have ordered 173 A380 aircrafts in total.