{"id":2638,"date":"2015-09-14T14:59:29","date_gmt":"2015-09-14T17:59:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/?p=2638"},"modified":"2015-09-17T15:17:31","modified_gmt":"2015-09-17T18:17:31","slug":"airbus-officially-opens-u-s-manufacturing-facility-in-alabama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/2015\/09\/14\/airbus-officially-opens-u-s-manufacturing-facility-in-alabama\/","title":{"rendered":"Airbus officially opens U.S. manufacturing facility in Alabama"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Jean-Michel Guhl<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The new Airbus aircraft final assembly plant in Mobile, Alabama. Located on the west bank of the Mobile River where she flows into the Gulf of Mexico it is the site of the former U.S. Air Force Brookley AFB. Some five thousands single-aisle Airbus airliners should normally roll out from this factory over the two decades to come ! \u00a9Airbus<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In a much-anticipated ceremony today in Mobile, Alabama, Airbus inaugurated operations at its first ever U.S. Manufacturing Facility. The plant \u2013 which assembles the industry-leading family of A319s, A320s and A321s \u2013 is officially open for business, with a team of more than 250 Airbus manufacturing employees now at work on the first U.S.-made Airbus aircraft.<\/p>\n

Built on the site of the former USAF Brookley Air Force Base, Mobile’s first municipal airport \u2014 the original Bates Field \u2014 the site itself by the mouth of the Mobile River had historically been occupied from the time of the city’s founding, starting with the home of Mobile’s founding father, the French governor of Louisina, Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne, sieur de Bienville, in the early 18th century.<\/p>\n

Fabrice Br\u00e9gier and members of the new Airbus workforce in Mobile were joined at the inaugural ceremony today by Alabama Governor Robert Bentley, Airbus Group CEO Tom Enders, Senator Jeff Sessions, Congressman Bradley Byrne, and scores of other dignitaries, airline and aerospace executives, and local leaders. The industry- and community-wide event convened under the theme, \u201cLet\u2019s Get to Work \u2013 Together!\u201d and culminated in the ceremonial placement of a placard on a component of the first aircraft to be produced in Mobile. The placard reads, \u201cThis aircraft proudly made in the USA by the worldwide team from Airbus.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
A look into the past, a USAF Douglas C-74 Globemaster pictured at Brookley AFB, Alabama, in the early 1950s. \u00a9 USAF<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThe Airbus U.S. Manufacturing Facility is an important step forward in Airbus\u2019 strategy, strengthening our position as a leader and competitor in all of our key markets,\u201d Fabrice Br\u00e9gier continued. \u201cIt enables us to grow our already significant presence in America \u2013 the largest single-aisle aircraft market in the world \u2013 and to be closer to our U.S. customers and key supplier partners. At the same time, the expanded industrial capacity gives us more flexibility to increase production across Airbus to meet global demand. The U.S. facility is good news for the overall Airbus enterprise, as this greater production capacity creates global growth opportunities across the company and throughout our supply chain.\u201d<\/p>\n

Airbus announced plans for the $600 million U.S. Manufacturing Facility in 2012, and construction began at the Mobile Aeroplex at Brookley the following year. The first U.S.-made Airbus commercial aircraft \u2013 an A321 \u2013 is scheduled for delivery next spring. By 2018, the facility will produce between 40 and 50 single-aisle aircraft per year. Airbus\u2019 market forecast indicates a demand over the next 20 years (from all manufacturers) for some 4,700 single-aisle aircraft in North America alone.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur commercial aircraft production in Mobile signifies two things: that Airbus has become the first truly global aircraft manufacturer, and that Airbus is now also a truly American manufacturer,\u201d said Airbus President and CEO Fabrice Br\u00e9gier. \u201cWith the addition of our U.S. facility to our production network in Europe and Asia, we have strategically expanded our worldwide industrial base.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Airbus U.S. Manufacturing Facility joins several other Airbus and Airbus Group operations across the United States, including for example Airbus engineering offices in Alabama (Mobile) and Kansas (Wichita); an Airbus training centre in Florida (Miami); Airbus Defence & Space Military Aircraft facility in Alabama (Mobile); Airbus Helicopters factories and operations in Mississippi (Columbus) and Texas (Grand Prairie); and aircraft spares facilities in Georgia (Atlanta), Florida (Miami) and Virginia (Ashburn). The U.S. headquarters of Airbus, Airbus Defence & Space, and Airbus Group are located in Herndon, Virginia, while Airbus\u2019 Latin America headquarters is located in Miami. Airbus and Airbus Group are major customers of other U.S. aerospace companies as well, having purchased $16.5 billion of components and materials from American suppliers last year alone.<\/p>\n

The establishment of the Airbus U.S. Manufacturing Facility doubles the number of manufacturers of large commercial aircraft in the United States, creating jobs, expanding skills, and establishing a new aerospace centre of competence on the U.S. Gulf Coast. In addition to the new Alabama manufacturing site, Airbus assembles commercial aircraft at modern facilities in Hamburg (Germany), Tianjin (China) and Toulouse (France).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jean-Michel Guhl In a much-anticipated ceremony today in Mobile, Alabama, Airbus inaugurated operations at its first ever U.S. Manufacturing Facility. The plant \u2013 which assembles the industry-leading family of A319s, A320s and A321s \u2013 is officially open for business, with a team of more than 250 Airbus manufacturing employees now at work on the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2645,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[67,136,137],"class_list":["post-2638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-commercial-aviation","tag-airbus","tag-usaf","tag-us-air-force"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2638"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2638\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2644,"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2638\/revisions\/2644"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinaero.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}