To download image, click on it. For more CRJ900 first flight shots visit the Press Release Photos.

First in the Air. First to Market. Again.	October 20, 2001

On Saturday October 20th, the first production CRJ900 took flight. The flight lasted two hours and 3 minutes and was described by test pilot Chuck Ellis as "very smooth". The CRJ900 program is right on schedule for first airline deliveries in early 2003, well ahead of its 90-seat rivals.

Two days after the CRJ900 took flight, the new CRJ production facility at Mirabel was unveiled by Robert E. Brown, CEO and President of Bombardier. Mirabel, 25 km north of Montreal, is where the newest member of the family (and its younger sibling, the CRJ700) is now being assembled. Also present to help celebrate opening of the state-of-the-art facility were the Premier of Quebec, Bernard Landry and Martin Cauchon, the federal Secretary of State and Minister of National Revenue. Brown described the facility as an "expression of our absolute faith in the future of our products...".

On view for VIPs, employees and local media were all three sizes of the CRJ family- a Eurowings CRJ200 (a Team Lufthansa member), a CRJ700 in Horizon Airways livery plus the first production CRJ900, fresh from its first flight.

The CRJ ignited the regional jet revolution in the early 90s and continues to lead the way today. The CRJ-the World's First Family of Regional Jets.

(Note: the initial CRJ900 prototype was the CRJ700 C-FRJX, with "plugs" installed fore and aft of the wings--it flew for the first time on February 21, 2001)