The Coronavirus Will Postpone Production of the A220 Until Next Year

In early March 2020, Airbus’ Mirabel factory, where 2,700 people work, produced four A220 per month and eventually planned to increase that rate to 10 per month to keep up with demand.

Now, while Airbus will continue to manufacture planes, it is unable to ramp up production as planned. “The acceleration rate 4 to 5 pace will be slower than what we had expected, so we remain stable at 4 cadence longer, up to half of 2021. For the future, we cannot speculate.” said Annabelle Duchesne of Airbus Canada.

While Airbus has slowed production, demand has slowed down as well. Delta Air Lines, for example, was scheduled to receive 15 new Airbus A220s by the end of the year before the coronavirus outbreak. Now, Delta has indicated that it has no plans to take possession of any new planes at this time.

Airbus has also shelved its plans to create a second assembly line for the A321 because of the coronavirus pandemic. It will also cut production of its A320, A330, and A350 ranges by a third.