TOULOUSE, France, 23 Aug. 2011.Passenger turbopropregional aircraft manufacturer ATR in Toulouse, France, has delivered its first two ATR 72-600 70-seat passenger turboprop aircraft. The ATR 72-600 earned European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) certification last May. Its sister aircraft, the ATR 42-600, will be certified by the end of this year and is scheduled to enter service in 2012. The two-aircraft delivery is part of a 2009 order by Royal Air Maroc, the Moroccan national airline based in Casablanca, Morocco.The ATR 72-600 twin-engine turboprop has an avionics suite from Thales Group in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France. The turboprop's avionics feature a new glass cockpit with five aircraft displays and new communications, navigation, and monitoring systems. The avionics also has a new flight management system (FMS), automatic pilot, alert management, and a new computer with aircraft maintenance functions.Royal Air Maroc will use the ATR 720-600s on its domestic and its nearest international network. The airline's 2009 order for four ATR 72-600s and two ATR 42-600s was worth $125 million. ATR is a joint venture Alenia Aeronautica in Rome and The European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company N.V. (EADS) in Toulouse, France.
The ATR 72-600 has 2,750-horsepower Pratt & Whitney 127M engines, and can fly fully loaded for nearly 900 nautical miles in instrument-flight-rules conditions.
For more information contact ATR online at www.atraircraft.com, Royal Air Maroc at www.royalairmaroc.com, Alenia Aeronautica at www.alenia-aeronautica.it, or EADS at www.eads.com.
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