Japan’s MRJ launch postponed for two more years

Originally planned for its first delivery in 2013, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries has announced the fifth delay in the delivery of Japan’s long-awaited regional jet, this time by two years, with the first customer delivery moved back from 2018 to 2020. The Mitsubishi Regional Jet (MRJ) is Japan’s first domestically produced passenger plane for more than fifty years.

This, and previous delays, have been caused by design modifications which have to meet today’s strict safety standards and requirements, some of which have been altered through increased risks of terrorism. The company has confirmed that the current alterations are focused on “electrical configurations”. According to Nobuo Kishi, vice president of the company’s aviation unit, “We now have to think of risks that are unthinkable in the normal course of things, such as a massive flood of water damaging electrical systems or a bomb explosion destroying those systems.”

With the original program starting in 2008, it is now believed development costs could come in as much as 40% higher than US$1.3bn to US$1.6bn originally estimated, according to the company.

The twin-engine MRJ is the first commercial passenger plane to be built in Japan since 1962 and the YS-11 turboprop that was discontinued about a decade later. At 35 meters in length and seating approximately 80 passengers, the Mitsubishi regional jet was launched in 2014 and last year it completed a flight to the USA where it underwent testing.

Backed by the Japanese government and a consortium of major firms, including Toyota, the jet will be challenging the sector of the market currently occupied by Brazil’s Embraer and Canada’s Bombardier jets.