Airbus' new Mobile, Alabama, plant completed its first jet last week, commemorating the milestone with a maiden flight of the A321 that will go to JetBlue. The $600 million plant, which Mobile announced in 2012, began operations last fall as Airbus' first U.S. manufacturing site. The site, which Airbus expects to help fill demand for its A320 series of airliners in the coming decades, marks a victory after Mobile's struggle to win a major aviation employer. The city lost a bid to build military refueling tankers under a previously proposed Airbus contract. The company's biggest rival, Boeing, won that $35 billion contract in 2011 and is developing the KC-46 tanker for the Air Force at its base in Seattle.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://www.avweb.com/recent-updates/business-military/first-airbus-jet-flies-from-alabama-plant