The Chinese government has prepared a special event to celebrate the first year of commercial operation of the C919, a home-grown airliner developed by state-owned COMAC.
The ceremony in Shanghai marked the delivery of the sixth C919 to China Eastern Airlines (CEA), the type’s launch customer, and which was also the first jet in a huge order of 100 aircraft announced last September.
The C919 with registration B-919G is aircraft MSN 00012 as COMAC produced six test aircraft and another half dozen delivered to China Eastern Airlines.
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With a capacity similar to an Airbus A320, the C919 is the most advanced commercial aircraft ever developed in China and there must be hundreds of planes produced just to meet the demand of the country’s carriers.
The commercial debut of the C919 took place on May 28, 2023 on a flight between Shanghai and the capital Beijing. Since then, around 300,000 passengers have flown on the five aircraft in service, which have completed 6,000 flight hours.
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China Eastern has been flying the 164-seat jet to Chengdu and Xi’an, in addition to Beijing, always from Shanghai, where its main hub is located and is also close to the manufacturer’s facilities.
According to the airline’s planning, four more C919s should be received in 2024 and ten aircraft per year between 2025 and 2027, when the rate will increase to 15 jets.
In addition to China Eastern, the country’s other two largest carriers, Air China and China Southern, also announced orders for 100 C919s recently.
To meet demand, COMAC is already working to speed up the assembly line and also expand the plant area at Shanghai Pudong International Airport.
The next step is to obtain type certification for the C919 abroad, starting in Europe, where the EASA agency has already been evaluating the aircraft for some time.
According to Jie Yuwen, deputy director of the Civil Aviation Administration of China’s (CAAC), the goal is to obtain European approval in 2025, which is considered somewhat optimistic.