Attendees of the Paris Air Show, which started Monday, will likely get a look at Airbus’s new A350. Although no appearance has been formally announced, the betting is that Airbus will include a low and over or two at Le Bourget as part of its very early “test” flights for the new aircraft. As we reported last week the aircraft, which will compete with the Boeing 787 and Boeing 777 in the long-haul market, had its maiden flight last Friday and is minutes away at Toulouse. The Paris show is traditionally the stage for major order announcements by the big manufacturers and they didn’t disappoint on opening day. Airbus continued to rack up sales of its re-engined A320 Neo while Boeing announced a few sales of 777s. But so far Embraer has the biggest order of the show.
The Brazilian planemaker formally introduced its next generation of the E jet and also announced orders and options for up to 400 aircraft. Launch customer for the new aircraft, which has new wings, engines and cockpit and up to 144 seats, is Skywest. The aircraft is a response to Bombardier’s CSeries, which doesn’t have as many orders as Embraer announced Monday. Bombardier didn’t announce any new orders but it did reveal that start-up Odyssey Airlines was the previously unidentified customer for 10 CSeries. Odyssey will operate from London’s City Centre Airport and picked the CSeries for its quiet operation and ability to serve New York from there.
