PARIS -- Airbus clinched a deal for 100 single-aisle A320neo planes in its first big move on the opening day of the Paris Air Show, where the European planemaker is jockeying with Boeing for orders.
Airbus and General Electric's aircraft leasing arm, GE Capital Aviation Services, announced the firm order Monday.
The A320neo range of jets, designed to use less fuel than the original and widely used A320s, have proven popular and are competing with Boeing's 737 Max series.
Meanwhile, China's first large passenger jet, the C919, is competing with the A320 and 737 ranges.
Airbus also announced that it's studying a more fuel-efficient version of the superjumbo A380, which has struggled to win a big customer base. The A380plus could carry 80 more passengers and fly slightly farther.
Airbus and Boeing are expected to bring in about 200 new orders each at this week's show at Le Bourget, down from past years when Asian and Mideast carriers were growing rapidly.
For its part, Boeing announced plans for a new, longer version of its 737 Max jet in hopes of increasing orders for the single-aisle plane.
The chief executive officer of Boeing's commercial planes operations, Kevin McAllister, said Monday that the 737 Max-10 will offer customers more flexibility and seating space. It is expected to cost a bit more than the 737 Max-9, which runs at $119 million according to list prices.
Boeing will this week show off a 737 Max-9, which has struggled to attract customers.
The Max series of jets are designed to be a more fuel-efficient version of the workhorse 737, Boeing's most popular commercial plane.
Thousands of industry executives and aviation enthusiasts are expected at the biennial aviation and defense industry gathering this week.
The industry is eager to show off its wares after a string of public relations embarrassments recently -- from the United Airlines' passenger getting dragged off a flight to British Airways' widespread power failure.
A highlight of the first day of the show included a display by a stealthy high-tech F-35 fighter jet, its first ever acrobatic display.
The F-35 flew briefly at the Farnborough Air Show last year but chose Paris for its worldwide debut acrobatic demonstration.
The plane roared off Le Bourget airport's tarmac into a vertical climb, clawing at the air with howls from its 40,000 pounds of thrust. A series of loops and gravity-defying maneuvers then showed off its stunning maneuverability, with the jet turning corners so sharply that it seemed to carve a square in the sky. Looping back around, it slowed to a crawl above the airport -- a trick that in a dogfight could force faster pursuers to zoom past it.
"This is a beastly airplane," said chief F-35 test pilot Alan Norman.
A senior F-35 Air Force administrator, Brigadier General Select Todd Canterbury, said the daily displays of the new jet are to showcase its abilities and "reassure [allies] that we are committed to NATO 100 percent and that we have got the capability to respond to any action necessary."
Canterbury, director of the Air Force F-35 Integration Office at the Pentagon, also spoke about recent problems that grounded F-35s at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona. Since May 2, F-35 pilots on five occasions reported symptoms of oxygen deprivation, he said.
Engineers, test pilots, medics and other experts are "digging into this problem 24 hours a day," to try to identify the cause, Canterbury said.
Business on 06/20/2017