There was a blunt response from Finmeccanica yesterday at the Dubai Air Show to criticisms levelled at its products by its competitor for the US Army’s Future Cargo Aircraft (FCA) contract.
Finmeccanica’s Alenia subsidiary is teaming with L-3 Communications to offer the C-27J for the $1.3 billion deal, covering around 30 aircraft.
Last month, the Raytheon/EADS North America team offering the rival EADS Casa CN-235 and C-295 said that the C-27J’s predecessor C-27A and G222 aircraft had had reliability and maintenance shortcomings and that the new C-27J lacked sufficient operating hours to prove the deficiencies had been overcome.
Speaking after a press conference at the Dubai show yesterday, Giuseppe Maresca, Finmeccanica’s senior vice-president, marketing and commercial affairs, retorted: “Casa is circulating a lot of rumours on this but if you look at the record of accidents they have collected, they should be thinking more about themselves “
Source: Flight Daily News
