[ad_1]
Written by Tim Heffer and Joanna Prusinska
COLOGNE (Reuters) – Europe’s aviation safety regulator will take the necessary time to approve a Chinese-made C919 airliner, a senior official told Reuters, as Europe’s aviation safety regulator faces a shortage of jets and a safety crisis at Boeing. This dampened the Chinese government’s hopes of quickly entering the market where it is currently located.
China is ramping up regulatory pressure to win overseas support for its new jet, but industry officials warn that breakthrough approval from Western regulators could take years. .
The COMAC C919 narrow-body jet is designed to compete with best-selling models from leading aircraft manufacturers Airbus and Boeing, and entered service in China last May after receiving domestic safety certification in 2022.
Luc Titgat, acting director general of the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), said COMAC had first sought European approval in 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic halted operations. Bidding was resumed in November, calling for construction to be completed by 2026.
“To be honest, I don’t know if it’s possible yet. This plane is so new to us that we don’t know how easy or difficult it will be,” he said in an interview at EASA’s Cologne headquarters. .
“Things have continued to happen in China since 2019, so we now need to be briefed on the changes,” he added.
The comments come weeks after the Chinese state-owned aircraft maker flew the C919 at the Singapore Air Show, with Airbus’ waiting list full and Boeing facing production quality concerns for its 737 MAX. The company is promoting the aircraft as a new replacement.
To close any significant export deals, COMAC will need its design to gain wide acceptance from foreign regulators, led by EASA and the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration.
Under an EU-China agreement signed in 2019, European regulators will independently “verify” China’s certification of the jet to ensure imports meet their country’s safety standards. You need to decide whether or not to do so.
Without this approval, the C919 cannot fly in Europe.
“It’s going to be a huge task for us to reconnect the plane and understand what the plane looks like today,” Titgat said.
Titgat’s comments suggest that EASA is in a “technical proficiency” phase, which experts say is the first part of a certification process that could last more than five years.
Western regulators have tightened certification of aircraft since the 2018 and 2019 Boeing 737 MAX crashes exposed design and oversight flaws. But scrutiny of the new manufacturer’s first jet is expected to be particularly intense.
Irish low-cost airline Ryanair has said in the past that it would consider Chinese-made jets.
But Titgat said so far European airlines have not asked EASA to speed up the certification process so they can place orders.
At a conference held in Beijing in January, the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) announced plans to promote the internationalization of the C919 in 2024.
According to official reports, CAAC will work towards gaining European approval for the aircraft this year. Regulators have not disclosed details of the plan.
Chinese regulators and the aircraft manufacturer did not respond to requests for comment.
Following its international air show debut in Singapore, COMAC took the plane on a promotional tour of East Asia, landing in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia and Indonesia, where it met with airline and government officials. The final destination was Malaysia, where the plane arrived on Tuesday.
(Reporting by Tim Hepher, Joanna Plucinska; Additional reporting by Lisa Barrington; Editing by Tomasz Janowski)
[ad_2]
Source link
