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Browsing Tag: MRJ90

Mitsubishi Arrives in Washington State for the MRJ

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The Mitsubishi MRJ - Photo: Mitsubishi

The Mitsubishi MRJ – Photo: Mitsubishi

It has long been the plan of Mitsubishi Regional to bring their new regional jet family, the Mitsubishi Regional Jet MRJ90 and the MRJ70 (the number represents planned seating capacity) to Washington State to take advantage of the favorable weather and existing aviation talent in the region.

This week marked the official opening of the Seattle Engineering Center for Mitsubishi, and their partner Aerotec. Located quite close to Boeing Field, this center will bring 150 highly-skilled jobs to the Georgetown neighborhood of Seattle. 50 of those jobs will be intra-company transfers from Mitsubishi regional in Nagoya; the remainder will be local hires.

The front of the brand new Aerotec hangar at Grant County International Airport - Photo: Bernie Leighton | AirlineReporter

The front of the brand-new Aerotec hangar at Grant County International Airport – Photo: Bernie Leighton | AirlineReporter

Local firm Aerotec was chosen as a partner because of its expertise in flight test logistical and regulatory support. Or at least, so summarized their president Lee Human.

Sadly for local AvGeeks, the engineering center is separate from the flight test center. That is located at Grant County International Airport in Moses Lake, which is about three hours to the east of Seattle.

The facility in Moses Lake will have a hangar that is 65,000 square feet and house about 200 additional employees. It will be an important part of making sure that the MRJ is a successful airliner.

Catching Up with the New Eastern Air Lines

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A model at Farnborough showing the EAL livery on the MRJ90 - Photo: Jon Ostrower

A model at Farnborough showing the Eastern livery on the MRJ90 – Photo: Jon Ostrower

Whenever there is news that a startup airline is going to launch with a classic name-sake, I get a little excited. When press releases started coming in saying that Eastern Air Lines was going to start up again, I was happy, but of course skeptical.

Even back in May when they signed an initial order with Boeing and placed deposits for 10 737-800NG and 10 737 MAX 8 aircraft, I was unsure about the viability of the airline.

Then, last week at the Farnborough Airshow, they announced the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding for 20 Mitsubishi MRJ90 aircraft, with purchase rights to an additional 20. Now, I am starting to pay a bit more attention.