Boeing

The Aero Industry Development Center (AIDC) delivered the empennage for the first MD-95 production-model airplane on schedule during a ceremony here this week.

AIDC is one of 14 supplier-partners around the world building major components and systems for the new 100-seat passenger twinjet being developed by The Boeing Company.

Among officials attending the ceremony were Wang Chih-kang, the Republic of China's minister of economic affairs; and Tsai Chun-huei, chairman of AIDC. Representing Boeing were James Faherty, president of Boeing International Corp., and Jerry Callaghan, MD-95 development program manager at Douglas Products Division in Long Beach, Calif., where the airplane is being assembled.

"AIDC is committed to providing high-quality empennage assemblies," said Callaghan. "In just 22 months, they have been designing, tooling, fabricating and assembling the first production empennage in support of an on-time arrival at Long Beach in mid-January 1998."

As a new Boeing supplier, noted Callaghan, AIDC has had to certify more than 40 new processes, fabricate thousands of new tools, translate thousands of documents and learn to operate under strict commercial-quality and government-regulatory requirements." This team stepped up to the challenge and what you see here is the result," he said.

He said the MD-95 program is moving ahead very rapidly with three test airplanes and one production aircraft in various stages of assembly. First flight is planned for June 1998, followed a year later with first deliveries.