Tupolev to come up with Tu-204 new modifications

In the next few years, the Tupolev aircraft manufacturing firm will create, on the Tu-204 basis, several modifications of passenger airliners - Tu-204-200, Tu-204-300, Tu-204-400 and so on, Tupolev vice-president Sergei Ilyushenko said on Friday. He spoke up at the presentation of the new magazine World of Science at RIA Novosti.

The Tu-204 is the most updated Russian airliner, meeting all the requirements of the International Civil Aviation Organization, said Ilyushenko. The first specimens have been bought on the domestic aviation market and foreign-supply contracts have already been signed.

The new Tu-204 modifications are both for passenger and cargo carriage, said Ilyushenko.

Certification tests of the average-haul Tu-334 are under way, he said. "It will be put into mass production next year. This will resolve the problem of sustainable and full-scale air communication between regions of Russia", Ilyushenko said.

As regards the new scientific-technical publication World of Science, he wished it should publish more articles on Russia's aviation strides.

"Developments by Russian aircraft designers are original, up-to-date and are to provoke interest among young people. Just as popular-science publications in technical magazines used to evoke our desire to work in aviation design bureaus", said Sergei Ilyushenko.