The Airbus A220 is a family of five-abreast narrow-body airliners by Airbus Canada Limited Partnership. It was originally designed by Bombardier and had two years in service as the Bombardier CSeries. The program was launched on 13 July 2008, the smaller A220-100 (formerly CS100) made its maiden flight on 16 September 2013, was awarded an initial type certification by Transport Canada on 18 December 2015, and entered service on 15 July 2016 with launch operator Swiss Global Air Lines. The longer A220-300 (formerly CS300) first flew on 27 February 2015, received an initial type certification on 11 July 2016, and entered service with airBaltic on 14 December 2016. Powered by Pratt & Whitney PW1500G geared turbofan engines under its wings, the twinjet features fly-by-wire flight controls, a carbon composite wing, an aluminium-lithium fuselage and optimised aerodynamics for better fuel efficiency. The aircraft family offers maximum take-off weights from 63.1 to 70.9 t (139,000 to 156,000 lb), and cover a 6,390–6,670 km (3,450–3,600 nmi) range. Both launch operators recorded better-than-expected fuel burn and dispatch reliability, as well as positive feedback from passengers and crew. As of March 2022, the global A220 fleet had completed more than 530,000 flights over 815,000 block hours without accidents. The 35 m (115 ft) long A220-100 seats 108 to 133, while the 38.7 m (127 ft) long A220-300 seats 130 to 160. The ACJ TwoTwenty is the business jet version of the A220-100, launched in late 2020. As of March 2022, a total of 740 A220s had been ordered of which 204 had been delivered and were all in commercial service with 15 operators. Delta Air Lines is the largest operator with 55 aircraft in its fleet. At t he end of April 2022, QANTAS announced an order for 20 A220 aircraft as part of its domestic fleet replacement. The A220 family complements the A319neo in the Airbus range and competes with the largest variants of the Embraer E-Jet E2 family and the smaller Boeing 737 MAX-7 variant. In July 2018, the aircraft was rebranded as the A220 after Airbus acquired a 50.01% stake in the programme through a joint venture established in 2016. In August 2019, a second final assembly line opened at Airbus Mobile in Alabama, supplementing the main facility in Mirabel, Quebec. In February 2020, Airbus increased its share to 75% as Bombardier exited the program, while the Quebec government's Investissement Québec held the 25% balance. For a detailed history of the development from the Bombardier C series to the A220, click here. The Airbus A220 family of narrow-body aircraft was originally designed by Bombardier under the CSeries programme. The highly efficient engines and extensive use of composite materials, like the wide-body Boeing 787 Dreamliner and Airbus A350 XWB, contribute together up to 14% lower cash operating costs. The geared turbofan engine and the optimised aerodynamics can save up to 25% fuel per seat, a 25% reduction in maintenance costs and a noise footprint area up to 50% smaller than previous generation aircraft with a 18 EPNdB margin to chapter 4. The larger A220-300 (former CS300), is 6 tonnes lighter than the A319neo and nearly 8 tons lighter than the Boeing 737 MAX 7, helping it to achieve up to 12% operating costs savings and 15% with the current models.
