Airbus has delivered it 10,000th aircraft this week, just over a year and a half after it reached the 9,000 aircraft milestone.
The landmark aircraft was an A350-900 to Singapore Airlines – the carrier has a total of 62 of the next-generation aircraft on order, including seven of the ultra long-haul A350-900ULR variant, which will allow it to relaunch non-stop flights to the US from 2018.
The manufacturer made its first delivery in 1974, and says that “At current production rates, Airbus expects to deliver its 20,000th aircraft in approximately a decade – taking about one fourth of the time to produce its second 10,000 jetliners as compared to the first 10,000”.
Airbus said that its aircraft had performed over 110 million flights, travelling some 215 billion kilometres (around 1,500 times the distance between the Earth and the Sun), and carried over 12 billion passengers.
The group said that every member of its product line is a “record breaker”, from the A320 family which holds the mark as the most common aircraft in commercial service, to the A380 – the largest aircraft in commercial service.
Airbus delivered the first of its new A320neo aircraft earlier this year, and will launch the A330neo featuring the new Airspace cabins with TAP Portugal towards the end of 2017.
