China’s C919, after a year of domestic flights, preps its pitch for Western endorsement
- China’s domestically produced jet, the C919, has completed a year of commercial flights, so far on domestic routes with domestic carriers
- International certification is next step, but many wonder if sanctions in other fields indicate a lengthy or stalled process
Near Shanghai’s Pudong Airport, mainland China’s busiest gateway for international aviation, a husk of a jet sits forlorn on a slope. It has been immobile for years, gathering dust and rust, only able to look on with longing as modern jets – mostly of Western make – roar overhead.
This model of the ill-fated Y-10 – China’s first attempt at a home-grown airliner – has spent far more time on display at the main assembly site of Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (Comac) than it ever did gliding above the clouds.
In its brief life cycle, the Y-10 rode the early ups and downs of China’s aviation industry in the 1970s and 1980s, a volatile period after Beijing first broached the idea of developing a commercial jet. That experiment ended in no purchase orders, with the display model in Shanghai one of only two Y-10s still in existence.
But the story of China’s quest for a home-grown jet continues at the production facility nearby, where units of the C919 – the Y-10’s spiritual descendant – roll off the line. More than 30 years after funding constraints and design flaws clipped the wings of the Y-10, a new generation of airliners is bringing a decades-long ambition into reach.
But this auspicious start, from domestic certification to the beginning of commercial operations, is likely to be the easiest leg of a long journey to international relevance.
