MOSCOW. March 24 (Interfax-AVN) - China is contemplating the possibility of buying from Russia more Tupolev Tu-204 family aircraft, a source in the Russian aviation industry told Interfax-AVN on Monday.
"At the talks the Chinese expressed their wish to consider the possibility of extra purchases of several Tu-204 aircraft," he said.
This is largely due to the successful creation, in cooperation with Russian specialists, of a flying laboratory based around the Tu-204-120SE cargo aircraft, the source said. "In fact, the flying laboratory has already been created. It has performed a number of successful flights to date," the source said.
The Tupolev company is responsible for research and design of the aircraft, while the Chinese install special on-board equipment, he said.
"The Tu-204-120SE cargo aircraft, which was delivered to China earlier and is now being converted into a flying laboratory, is fitted with two Rolls Royce RB211-534E4 engines that are no longer in serial production. So we are now considering supplying Tu-204-100 aircraft to China with Russian serially-produced PS-90A or PS-90A2 engines," the source said.
Under the contract, China was to buy five Tu-204-120SE (cargo) aircraft, but only one has been delivered. The maximum takeoff weight of the plane is 105 tonnes, the maximum weight of its payload is 27 tonnes. Tu-204-120SE is designed to carry cargo up to 27,000 kilograms in international-class containers on air routes as long as 3,000 kilometers, or up to 10,500 kilograms to a distance of 7,400 kilometers. The aircraft was certified in Russia and validated (i.e. its Russian certificate was confirmed) in China.