CSeries Set To Perform High-Speed Taxi Tests

Bombardier hopes to perform high-speed taxi tests with its CSeries airliner on Thursday, in preparation for first flight “in the coming weeks.”

A company spokesman told AIN that program managers scrapped plans to perform the tests on Wednesday due to weather conditions in the Montreal area. “Optimal weather and dry runway are required for [high-speed] taxi tests,” he said in an e-mailed response to queries about program status. “[We] did not get that in Montreal today. Crossing fingers for tomorrow!”

Transport Canada issued Bombardier’s CSeries Flight Test Vehicle 1 (FTV1) its flight-test permit last week following a series of pre-flight tests including low-speed taxi runs. First expected to fly by the end of last year, the CSeries remains on the ground following the failure of Bombardier to meet two subsequent targets for first flight—one at the end of June and the other at the end of July. It blamed the most recent setback on integration delays involving certain unnamed systems.