(Yicai) Dec. 20 -- The 14 C919 in operation have carried a total of one million passengers so far, according to the vice president of Commercial Aircraft Corporation of Chin.

C919 planes carried half a million passengers as of Sept. 2 and reached the one million milestone yesterday, Wei Yingbiao said at an industry conference yesterday.

China Eastern Airlines has received nine C919, while Air China has two and China Southern Airlines three, Wei noted. The first C919 was delivered to China Eastern in December 2022 and was put into operation in May last year. The two other carriers received their first C919 in August this year.

The average seat occupancy rate of the 14 C919 planes in operation is between 86 percent and 90 percent, higher than that of other large passenger planes, said Wu Guanghui, an academician at the Chinese Academy of Engineering. The C919's fuel consumption is comparable to that of foreign-made counterparts, Wu added.

The C909, a regional passenger plane also developed by Comac and previously known as ARJ21, completed its first commercial flight in June 2016. There are now 156 such aircraft in operation, having carried more than 19 million passengers, Wei noted.

In recent years, Comac has developed various versions of the C909, including business jets and medical, emergency rescue command, cargo, and firefighting aircraft, Wei said.

Moreover, Comac is developing a high-altitude version of the C919 and working on the preliminary scheme for an extended-range version of the plane.

The high-altitude C919 aims to meet the take-off and landing requirements of airports in the western plateau regions, while the extended-range one is designed for medium-to-long-haul flights and has an increased passenger capacity of 210 seats and an extended maximum range of 4,500 kilometers.

A complete supply chain around Comac is taking shape in the Chinese civil aviation market, Wu pointed out, adding that the company has over 1,000 Chinese suppliers from 24 provincial-level regions and more than 500 foreign suppliers from 23 countries and regions.

Editor: Futura Costaglione