Russia to promote Superjet 100 at Le Bourget air show

MOSCOW, June 11 (RIA Novosti) – Russia will focus on the promotion of
its new Superjet 100 passenger airliner at Le Bourget 2009 air show, a
Russian business daily said on Thursday.
The 48th Paris Air Show at Le Bourget on June 15-21, which marks 100
years of technological innovation in aeronautics and space conquest,
will be the first chance for most aviation enthusiasts to get a look
at the new plane.
Superjet 100 will be the only flying model among the Russian aircraft
displayed at the show in order to draw all public attention to the
plane, the Vedomosti newspaper cited Russian aircraft industry sources
as saying.
The plane has already landed at Le Bourget, and will be making daily
demonstration flights during the show.
The Superjet 100 project is a family of medium-haul passenger aircraft
developed by Russia’s Sukhoi Civil Aircraft company in cooperation
with U.S. and European aviation corporations, including Boeing,
Snecma, Thales, Messier Dowty, Liebherr Aerospace and Honeywell.
The first Superjet 100 aircraft has already made several long-distance
and 40 short-distance test flights, clocking over 100 flight hours. A
total of four planes will take part in the Russian certification
program, which should be completed in the third quarter of 2009.
International certification is expected by mid-2010.
Sukhoi, part of the United Aircraft Corporation (UAC), plans to
manufacture at least 700 Superjet 100s, and intends to sell 35% of
them to North America, 25% to Europe, 10% to Latin America, and 7% to
Russia and China.
The company earlier said it had about 100 solid orders for the
Superjet 100 so far and planned to sign a new deal during the Le
Bourget air show for 20 additional planes, worth an estimated $600
million.
Armenia’s national airline, Armavia, will most likely be the first
country to receive a Superjet 100, followed by Russian flagship
carrier Aeroflot.