Boeing, CFM International Celebrate delivery of 4,000th CFM56-7B Engine
Every three seconds of every day with one of more 450 operators around the globe, an airplane powered by industry-leading CFM56 engines is taking off.
This week, Boeing and CFM International are celebrating another exceptional achievement: delivery of the 4,000th CFM56-7B engine.
A ceremony was organized in Snecma Villaroche plant on June 15, 2006. This ceremony was hosted by Marc Ventre, Chairman and CEO of Snecma and witnessed by Mark Jenkins, vice president and general manager of Boeing’s 737 airplane programs and Eric Bachelet, president and CEO of CFM International.
The first CFM56-7-powered 737-700 was delivered to launch customer Southwest Airlines in December 1997. In July 2006, Southwest is schedule to take delivery of the 2,000th Next-Generation 737 airplane.
"You should be very proud of the CFM56-7 engine," said Mark Jenkins, vice president and general manager of Boeing’s 737 airplane programs.
"The technology CFM brought to the program has supported the 737’s reliability and low cost of ownership. Our mutual airline customers are very happy with the CFM engines and Boeing Next-Generation 737 airplanes. In fact, our customers have voted by ordering 569 737s last year and by placing more than 300 orders for the airplane this year alone."
The CFM56-7B-powered Boeing 737-600/-700/-800/-900 fleet has achieved a remarkable 50 million engine flight hours in just eight years of revenue service with 160 operators worldwide - the fastest accumulation of flight hours in commercial aviation history.
“The success of this program has been overwhelming,” said Eric Bachelet, president and CEO of CFM International. “We are honored that Boeing and the airlines made us such an integral part of their team. We’ve been able to develop and refine an airplane/engine combination that provides exceptional operating economics for our customers.”
The CFM56-7B brings the industry’s most advanced technology to 737, giving customers dramatically lower operating costs while maintaining industry-leading performance, reliability, and operability. The CFM56-7B is so reliable powering the Boeing 737 that, statistically, a pilot will experience an in-flight shutdown only once every 110 years. How can this be? The engine’s current in-flight shutdown rate is 0.003, which translates to one in-flight shutdown every 333,333-flight hours. Based on a typical 737 utilization rate of about 3,000 hours of operation annually, that equates to one in-flight shutdown event roughly every 110 years. The aircraft’s 99.96 percent dispatch reliability rate translates to less than one departure per 2,000 flights being delayed 15 minutes or more or canceled.
CFM56-7B engines are produced by CFM International, a 50/50 joint company between GE and Snecma.
