LE BOURGET (France), June 15 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's new Superjet 100 passenger airliner made its first demonstration flight at Le Bourget 2009 air show in France on Monday.
The flight, which was conducted in showers and low cloud, only lasted for a few minutes, but the Superjet 100 will be making daily flights. In order to maximize public attention, the new jetliner will be the only Russian exhibit taking to the air at the show.
The 48th International Paris Air Show, which ends on Saturday, is the first chance for most aviation enthusiasts to get a look at the new plane.
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.
Hungarian national air carrier Malev Airlines signed on Monday a statement of intent with Sukhoi to purchase 30 Superjet 100 for 710 million euros ($980 million). Russian national development bank VEB owns 49% of the struggling airline and provides the chairman of the Malev board.
A spokesman for Sukhoi said that the planes will be delivered starting from 2011 at the amount of six aircraft annually.
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.
