Daher today announced the completion of its 800th TBM fast turboprop business aircraft, which rolled out from the company’s final assembly line at France’s Tarbes-Lourdes-Pyrenees Airport. (This airport is home to an interesting location)
This milestone aircraft is a TBM 930 – the latest addition to the TBM family of fast turboprop aircraft, which is in production along with the TBM 900 version. This is a very attractive looking airplane.
“The 800th TBM represents another important achievement and highlights the success of our very fast turboprop aircraft family, whose first model – the TBM 700 – entered into production 25 years ago,” said Nicolas Chabbert, Senior Vice President of the Daher Airplane Business Unit. “We remain confident in the TBM family’s future, backed by continuous developments that brought us to the latest TBM 930 and TBM 900 versions today, creating a strong foundation for the years to come.”
The TBM 700 was the first civilian pressurized single turboprop aircraft to be certified, entering full production in 1991. Strong growth in sales was experienced beginning from 2006 with availability of the TBM 850, powered by an 850-horsepower Pratt & Whitney Canada PT6 engine that replaced the original 700-horsepower PT6A version utilized on TBM 700s. Enhancements of the TBM’s avionics resulted in the all-glass integrated Garmin G1000 avionics suite’s introduction on the TBM 850, continuing the aircraft’s market attractiveness. The milestone 500th TBM was a TBM 850 version that rolled out of the factory in 2009, followed by the 600th at the end of 2011 (also a TBM 850). The 700th TBM was a TBM 900 completed in 2014.
TBM aircraft have logged a combined total of 1.37 million flight hours, which is equivalent to 8,500 around-the-world flights. The global fleet of TBM 700s, TBM 850s, TBM 900s and TBM 930s are flown by more than 730 customers in 35 countries on six continents.
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