Boeing’s latest addition to the Boeing 737-10 family has completed its first flight, marking a new phase in the restart of this type of medium-range machine, which was shut down for 20 months after two fatal crashes, France reported. press.
The white-and-blue plane took off at 10:07 a.m. local time (5:07 p.m. GMT); 20:07 h. Bulg. peak yesterday) from Renton, Washington, and after flying over clear skies landed safely in Seattle at 12:38 p.m. (7:38 p.m. GMT; 10:38 p.m. Bulgarian time last night).
“The plane works great,” said Jennifer Henderson, chief pilot of the 737 program.
“The route we took allowed us to test the systems, the flight control and the flight control qualities, all these maneuvers went exactly as we had hoped,” she added, quoted in a statement.
The aircraft, which complements the range of single-fuselage machines of the Seattle giant (737-7, 8 and 9), has yet to pass numerous tests before the first units are delivered to customers. This is expected to happen in 2023.
The 737-10, the largest of the MAX series, can carry up to 230 passengers over a distance of 6,110 kilometers. It is offered at a catalog price of 134.9 million dollars.
Officially launched in 2017, the 737-10 aimed to compete with Airbus’ A321neo in the single-lane segment with more than 200 seats.
The first deliveries were originally supposed to be made in 2020, but the date has already been postponed twice.
Boeing had to deal with the frustrations of 737 MAX around the world, after two crashes in a short period of time, in 2018 and 2019, killed a total of 346 people, recalls AFP.
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