C-17 line is again facing closure

Boeing Co. said Friday that it had resumed early steps toward shutting the production line for its C-17 Air Force transport plane in Long Beach because of a lack of new orders.

In a repeat of last summer, Boeing said it had begun telling suppliers to stop producing parts for the C-17, the last of which would roll out of the Long Beach factory in mid-2009 unless further orders were placed for the four-engine jet.

It takes about 34 months from the production of the first part to final assembly.

Although the Air Force did not request additional C-17s, Congress allocated $2.1 billion for the purchase of 10 planes last fall to extend the life of the factory by a year.

Boeing has built 161 C-17s for the Air Force and has 29 more on the books. Under a previous multiyear contract, Boeing was scheduled to produce the last C-17 in 2008.

But the program is likely to get another reprieve, much as it did last fall, because of strong congressional support, said Richard Aboulafia, an analyst with Teal Group, an aerospace research firm.

“Congress might have to increase here and there, but it can be done,” he said. “There is a very strong chance that there will be another dozen added this year.”

About 5,500 people work at the C-17 plant and an additional 25,000 work for 700 companies in 42 states that supply parts for the aircraft.

Shutdown of the program would bring to a close almost a century of airplane manufacturing in Southern California. Boeing said it could begin workforce cuts next year.

The Air Force has maintained that it wants to buy more C-17s but can’t because of budget constraints caused in part by congressional mandates that it also upgrade aging C-5 cargo planes.

The Pentagon is weighing whether the upgrades are worth the cost, but the study is not expected to be completed until 2010, or after the C-17 line is scheduled to close.

The plane has been in production since the early 1990s and the program has been one of Boeing’s largest, generating about $3 billion in annual sales.

Boeing, headquartered in Chicago, is the largest private employer in Southern California, with about 31,000 employees.

In a conference call Friday, David Bowman, Boeing’s C-17 program manager, said the prospects for additional purchases were “darker” than last year.

“I will never give up, but it is much more risky this year,” he said, adding that the company would need a follow-up order of at least 16 C-17 aircraft to extend production another year to 2010.

“We’re starting out with a much bigger number ... and that’s particularly hard to add to the budget.”

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peter.pae@latimes.com