During the ongoing annual top-level political event in China, the Two Sessions, the chief designer of Chinese-built C919 airliner updated that development of C919 is proceeding in an orderly manner according to the plan.
C919 is a narrow-body twinjet airliner program launched in 2008, and developed by Chinese state-owned aerospace manufacturer COMAC.
According to the chief designer, all the six C919 prototype aircraft of the program have carried out test flights in various locations from last year. It is currently undergoing the processes to obtain related flight certificates. As of now, there are 28 clients in the country and abroad, and the total number of orders reached 815.
Report at the time indicates that the aircraft is expected to enter commercial service with OTT Airlines, a newly established subsidiary of China Eastern Airlines (CIAH) (CEA) , in either 2021 or 2022.
On the other hand, COMAC has delivered 25 ARJ21, a 78–90 seat regional jet also manufactured by the company, to Chengdu Airlines, Genghis Khan Airlines, Jiangxi Air and other customers. The three airlines have opened 50 routes, operated within 50 cities and transferred more than 830000 passengers.
The chief designer also disclosed that at present, the overall technical scheme of the long-range wide-body airliner CR929 had been determined, and the preliminary design work has started.
CR929 airliner is developed by Chinese COMAC and Russian United Aircraft Corporation (UAC) jointly, with a basic range of 12000 km and a standard three-cabin layout of 280 seats, to challenge the Airbus and Boeing duopoly.