Boeing has revealed the cockpit layout and design for the brand new wide-body aircraft 777X. The announcement was made during the Dubai Airshow just as it secured a massive order from Dubai-native Emirates Airlines who put in a massive order for the 787 aircraft.
Looking over the new design of the aircraft you can see that it shares much more with the 787 than it does the older 777 modes on the inside. The major change is very large touchscreen displays that are fully interactive. Boeing says that this will being a better experience for pilots and make it much easier to navigate around.
While the older 777s have a brown interior the new 777X takes from the 787 by bringing in a darker interior and layout very similar to the 787. During an interview Boeing said that the aircraft shares a same type rating with the older 777s but the same cockpit familiarity with the 787. This is in hopes it will allow 787 pilots to easily transition to flying the 777 with minimal extra training involved to cross certify.
For airlines with massive fleets of wide-body aircraft this will be a huge step towards training and reducing the amount of time it will take for the pilots to certify in this aircraft. For example, if United were to buy the 777X they could recruit their current 787 pilots to cross-certify in the 777X with minimal cost to the airline for the retraining that it will take.
Boeing has really been pushing hard for their new wide-body lineup of aircraft. The 787 is probably one of the most popular new wide-body aircraft on the market with the 777 coming up closely in second. My hope is that they will bring more of the 787s great features over to the 777X and bring us closer to a unified experience on Boeing models.
