Dassault Falcon Service to expand maintenance capacity at Bordeaux-Merignac

Dassault Falcon Service has announced plans to build a heavy maintenance, repair and overhaul facility at Bordeaux-Mérignac Airport in southwestern France. The 7,200 m² facility will be built on a parcel of land adjacent to the Dassault Aviation manufacturing plant and will serve Falcon 7X, 8X and 5X large cabin aircraft. It will complement DFS’s existing MR&O installations at Le Bourget Airport near Paris. The new facility, capable of accommodating six aircraft, is expected to commence operations in mid-2016, in time to handle initial C Checks for the fast-selling Falcon 7X, and will eventually employ up to 70 specialists and technicians. More than 230 Falcon 7X’s are now in operation and the fleet leaders (the oldest aircraft in the fleet) will begin requiring heavy maintenance by 2016. The decision to locate the new maintenance facility in Merignac was motivated by the large pool of skilled aviation workers and subcontractors in the Bordeaux area and the multiple benefits offered by the nearby Dassault Aviation assembly plant, such as paint shops.