Boeing Co., the world’s second-largest commercial airplane maker, on Wednesday said second-quarter earnings fell 19 percent after it took a previously disclosed charge of $248 million from a defense program.

The Chicago-based company on Wednesday reaffirmed its earnings outlook for 2008 and 2009 and said its backlog rose 6 percent to a record $346 billion, bolstered by commercial airplane orders.

Boeing reported earnings of $852 million, or $1.16 per share, for the three months ended June 30, compared with $1.05 billion, or $1.35 per share, a year earlier.

Revenue remained essentially flat at $17 billion.

Excluding the charge tied to the Airborne Early Warning & Control program, the company earned $1.38 per share.

Analysts polled by Thomson Financial, on average, expected profit of $1.23 per share on revenue of $17.24 billion. Those estimates typically exclude one-time items.

Earlier this month, Boeing said quarterly results would include the charge due to delays in the program.

“While we faced some challenges this quarter that affected our results, we remain confident in our outlook for the remainder of this year and 2009,” Jim McNerney, Boeing’s chairman, president and chief executive, said in a statement.

For the first half of the year, profit increased 7 percent to $2.1 billion and revenue edged up 2 percent to $33 billion.

Boeing reaffirmed its 2008 earnings guidance of between $5.70 and $5.85 per share and its 2009 guidance of between $6.80 and $7.00 per share.

Shares of Boeing fell about 5 percent in pre-market trading.

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