China’s first domestically constructed passenger plane flew commercially on Sunday, a milestone in the nation’s decades-long drive to compete with Western airlines.
Beijing thinks the C919 commercial airliner will compete with the Boeing 737 MAX and Airbus A320 despite using foreign parts.
As relations with the West deteriorated, its first mass-market airplane would reduce its dependence on foreign technology.
“In the future, most passengers will be able to choose to travel by large, domestically produced aircraft,” CCTV stated.
CCTV said that China Eastern Airlines flight MU9191 from Shanghai “arrived smoothly” in Beijing at 12:30 pm, 40 minutes early. Before a brief ceremony on the tarmac, passengers exited the plane and entered the terminal.
The flight was smooth, comfortable, and unforgettable. “I’ll remember this for a long time,” a male passenger told CCTV.
On Sunday morning, the broadcaster showed the jet taking off from Shanghai Hongqiao Airport with 130 passengers.
State media showed passengers admiring the sleek white plane at the sun-drenched Shanghai runway before boarding. CCTV said passengers received crimson boarding cards and a lavish “themed meal” to honor the flight. While cutting a cake, passengers waved flags and sang patriotic songs.
China has aggressively invested in the domestic jet to become self-sufficient in critical technology.
The state-owned Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC) manufactures the aircraft, but many parts, including engines, are imported.
COMAC’s head of marketing and sales, Zhang Xiaoguang, told the official news agency Xinhua that the flight was a “coming-of-age ceremony (for) the new aircraft” and that the C919 “will get better if it stands the test of the market.”The northern city’s first assembly plant started in 2008 and produced four A320s a month, with Airbus planning to raise that to six by year’s end.
CCTV claimed that China Eastern’s C919 would operate on its Shanghai-Chengdu route starting Monday.
State media called last year’s ceremony at Shanghai’s airport to hand off the narrow-body jet’s first model to China Eastern “an important milestone” for the country’s aircraft industry.
In January, COMAC’s deputy general manager Zhang Yujin told the state-backed Shanghai newspaper The Paper that the C919 had 1,200 orders. Zhang claimed COMAC would produce 150 models annually in five years.
Airbus and Boeing are targeting Asia, particularly China, to capitalize on the country’s increasing middle class’s desire for air travel.
Last month, Airbus signed a deal to build a second A320 final assembly line in Tianjin, doubling its production capacity in China.
