Airplane Is To Be Flight Tested At Moses Lake, WA

The first of four Mitsubishi MRJ airplanes arrived Wednesday at Moses Lake, WA to begin flight testing even as the company is saying that production will be delayed by another year.

The Seattle Times reports that, according to the Nikkei Asian Review, Mitsubishi has has decided to "rebalance the aircraft after apparently repositioning certain components."

Mitsubishi Aircraft said in a news release announcing the ferry flight of the first test article to the U.S. that it remains "committed to achieving steady progress in flight tests with the assistance of three engineering bases (Moses Lake Flight Test Center, the MRJ flight test center within Grant County International Airport; Seattle Engineering Center and Mitsubishi Aircraft Headquarters in Japan) working together toward the success of the MRJ project", and that it still hopes for type certification in 2018.

But Bloomberg News has reported and ANA, the launch customer for the airplane, confirmed that Mitsubishi had informed the airline of possible delays late last month, and has not offered a revised delivery date for the airplane.

The aircraft is being flight tested in the Pacific northwest due to the congestion in airspace over Japan, according to the report.

(Image from file

FMI: www.flythemrj.com