Farnborough debut still in prospect for E190-E2

Embraer is hopeful of giving a Farnborough air show debut to its E190-E2, despite previous indications to the contrary.

Since the maiden sortie of the re-engined, re-winged E-Jet on 23 May, around 37h has been accumulated in test flights.

However, it needs to have completed around 50-60h before attempting the transatlantic crossing from Brazil to the UK, says Luis Carlos Affonso, chief operations officer at Embraer Commercial Aviation.

He adds: "The testing is going very well. If we continue to have these good results, we will take it to Farnborough."

The prototype has already performed wet-runway brake efficiency trials, he says, is in preparation for arrival in the UK.

"Because it rains a lot in England we have decided to do these wet runway tests," he jokes.

Embraer had as late as February this year ruled out an appearance at the UK show.

It has so far taken in 267 firm orders for E2-family aircraft, a figure that has remained largely unchanged over the past 12 months.

However, Affonso is untroubled by the static backlog and believes more orders will come as flight-test data and performance characteristics become clear.

"We have more firm orders for the E2 than we had on the E1 during the same period," he notes.