Today, the first variant of the Airbus A320neo family took to the sky – with an Airbus A321neo making its first flight.
Airbus A321neo taking off from Airbus Hamburg on its first flight – Image, Airbus
The Airbus A321neo made its first flight from Airbus’s base in Hamburg today, making a five hours and 29 minutes sortie, where tests were conducted and to validate the aircraft’s flight envelope.
This A321neo is powered by CFM International Leap-1A engines (compared to the A320neo which flew out on Pratt and Whitney PurePower PW1100G engines).
Airbus will be hoping to deliver the first A321neo towards the end of 2016.
The A321neo is the extended length version of the A320neo family for those operators who are looking towards a high-capacity aircraft – but don’t want to go widebody.
The A321neo will join the cadre of A320neo aircraft – supporting the flight test programmes for certification.
PS: Boeing fan. I was going to write about the 737 MAX first flight – but there was a major issue at the flat that day (and with the laptop… hence why it never got covered here. Others have done a far better job than I have)
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Looks good! Let the Airbus/Boeing dogfight continue!