MUKILTEO — The Boeing Co. and the Port of Everett celebrated the arrival Dec. 15 of an oversized shipping container filled with skin panels from Japan for the 1,000th Boeing 777 wide-body jet the company is building in its Everett factory.

The Port of Everett receives all the oversized parts from overseas suppliers that Boeing uses in its 747, 767 and 777 airplanes. This shipment came from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in Hiroshima, Japan.

“Through our partnership, Boeing and the port have grown together,” Port Executive Director John Mohr said.

But until the port opened the Mount Baker Terminal in 2008, moving those giant containers — measuring 35 feet tall, 35 feet wide and 140 feet long — required a full shutdown of the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway line between Everett and Mukilteo. It affected freight and passenger rail service for up to two hours at a time, port commissioner and Economic Alliance Snohomish County CEO Troy McClelland said.

Work on the terminal, located just east of the decommissioned U.S. Air Force fuel depot on Mukilteo’s waterfront, began in 2005.

Containers are unloaded at the port and barged across Port Gardner Bay to the Mount Baker Terminal, where rail cars wait on a spur line. From there, the loaded cars cross the main line and take another spur — at 5.7 percent, the steepest operating grade in North America — that goes up Japanese Gulch to the Boeing factory. Closing the BNSF main line to get the container cars across takes less than 30 minutes.

McClelland said the Mount Baker Terminal and the container with parts for the 1,000th Boeing 777 represents the importance the port places on Snohomish County’s aerospace industry, besides improving rail transportation and infrastructure.

“It’s not just about a number. It’s about the people who helped us get here,” he said. “It keeps the region competitive.”

The terminal has handled 4,500 containers since it opened. Except for a banner affixed to it, the container of parts for the 1,000th Boeing 777 looked like all the other gray containers stacked at the terminal. The parts that prompted Thursday’s festivities will go into the 102nd 777 jet that Emirates Airline has ordered. That plane will be completed in February and delivered in March, said Larry Loftis, Boeing vice president and 777 program manager.

“As the nation’s largest exporter in the nation’s most trade-dependent state, Boeing’s success hinges on smoothly running operations to deliver airplanes reliably to customers around the world,” Loftis said.

“The port system is an important part of our operations network. We are grateful for the Port of Everett’s support to keep parts and materials efficiently flowing to our factories, which directly links to keeping Boeing and Washington State competitive and restoring the region’s economy,” he said.

Loftis noted that the 777 reached the 1,000-unit production milestone faster than either of its Boeing wide-body siblings: the 747 took 23 years to reach 1,000 and the 767 took 29 years.

The 1,000th 777 is being built 19 years after the jet debuted, he said. Airlines love it for its efficiency and reliability, he said. Passengers love it for its comfort.

Boeing’s on pace to break its single-year record for 777 orders with 200 so far this year, Loftis said.

“The Port of Everett has partnered with Boeing on the supply chain logistics for the 777 since day one,” Mohr said. “We are proud to be a part of this historic milestone and look forward to supporting Boeing’s expanding business now and into the future.”

Kurt Batdorf: 425-339-3102, kbatdorf@scbj.com.