Estimated reading time 1 minute, 58 seconds.
Air Canada’s first Airbus A220 was unveiled this week when it rolled out of the painting hangar at the A220 final assembly line in Mirabel, Que.
In December, Air Canada will be the first Canadian airline to take delivery of this Canadian-designed and developed aircraft when it receives the first of its 45 A220s on order. The A220 features an innovative cabin design, as well as significantly lower emissions and a reduced noise footprint.
The A220-300 for Air Canada will provide passengers with superior comfort in a 137-seat dual-class cabin layout. Air Canada’s brand new A220-300s will replace the flag carrier’s existing mainline fleet of smaller, older narrow-body aircraft and support the airline’s hub and network growth, creating one of the world’s youngest and most fuel efficient fleets.
Now that the aircraft is decked out in Air Canada’s livery, it has moved to pre-flight activities in the A220 flight line hangar in Mirabel, before taking off for its first flight later this fall.
Currently, there are 94 A220 aircraft flying with six operators on regional and transcontinental routes in Asia, America, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, proving the great versatility of Airbus’ latest family member. The A220 has an order book of 530 aircraft as of the end of October 2019.
Very nice, but, so sad Bombardier had to loose ownership of it’s own product. 🙁 **footnote: do not care for Air Canada’s current livery. With all the beautiful liveries out there, it is much too bland for me. Too stark. Especially dislike the “racoon” black band over the cockpit windows. Looses the ‘character’ of each individual aircraft. Air Canada needs more SPLASH in its livery. Cannot wait for the next change with hope and optimism for something great!! ….just saying…
I have been a member of Aeroplan and I have approximately 950,000 air miles flow. I just got back from Latvia and I flew into and out of Latvia with Air Baltic which is Latvia’s Official AirLine of the country. I read that Air Baltic have been using the A200 for over 2 years now with 22 of these beautiful planes. They now have on order for immediate delivery of another 25 units.
Air Baltic are looking to get rid or or phase out their Boeing 737-300 and use all A200’s/ The President of AirBaltic wrote a very well written letter that explains why they went with and are sticking with the A220 and the reasons are very flattering to Bombardier to say the least.
My question is, why has it taken this long for Air Canada to get onboard and get these incredible planes in their fleet sooner. The Leg Room, the over sized Bathrooms where a person such as myself being 6’1 can stand up straight and still have another 6″- 8″‘s of more headspace while standing. To Bombardier, you have outdone yourself. A beautiful plane. Cheers Gerald M Sullivan