Bombardier expects the largest airplane it has ever built–the 100-seat CRJ1000–to take to the skies for the first time this month, on schedule and on budget. Plans call for the only CRJ1000 prototype to embark on a 14-month flight test regime expected to result in certification and first delivery to launch customer Brit Air in the fourth quarter of next year.
The fourth major iteration of the company’s immensely successful regional jet line, the CRJ1000 has quietly taken shape over the course of the last 15 months at the company’s Mirabel, Quebec production facilities–devoid of much of the fanfare typically associated with the creation of a new airplane. So when virtually no news about possible delays surfaced between the time Bombardier launched the program in February last year and the days leading to first flight, the accomplishment went largely unnoticed.
But while a perception that paints the latest CRJ as “just another stretch” of a now 16-year-old platform might explain the unusually subdued build-up to first flight, lengthening the CRJ airframe for the third time involved much more than just inserting a pair of fuselage plugs.
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