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The Bombardier CRJ900 is a Canadian-built twin-engine regional jet, a stretched derivative of the CRJ700 designed to carry up to 90 passengers on short- to medium-haul routes. It became one of the mainstays of North American regional airline flying, operated under the liveries of major network carriers by feeder airlines such as SkyWest, Endeavor Air, PSA Airlines and Mesa Airlines, and it is of interest to sim pilots as the workhorse jet of everyday regional airline operations.
The CRJ900 is a member of the Bombardier CRJ700 series family of regional jets, itself a larger derivative of the original Canadair Regional Jet (CRJ100/200) family. Built by Bombardier Aviation in Canada, it is a low-wing, T-tailed, twin-engine airliner flown by a two-pilot crew and seating up to 90 passengers. It sits between the smaller CRJ700 and the larger CRJ1000 in the family, and was designed specifically for CRJ200 and CRJ700 operators wanting more capacity without a new type rating.
The CRJ900 grew out of Bombardier's CRJ-X programme, launched in 1994 to produce larger derivatives of the CRJ100/200 to compete with aircraft such as the Fokker 70/100 and the British Aerospace 146; this programme produced the CRJ700, which first flew on 27 May 1999. In September 1998 Bombardier considered an all-new 90-seat design, the BRJ-X, but instead chose to stretch the CRJ700 further, and this became the CRJ900. Development was underway by 1999 with an investment of around C$200 million, and the aircraft was initially priced at $28-29 million. Formal launch was delayed from May 2000 due to contract negotiations before being officially introduced in July 2000. One of the CRJ700 prototypes was converted to CRJ900 configuration by adding fuselage plugs fore and aft of the wing, and was later joined by a purpose-built second test aircraft. The CRJ900 made its maiden flight on 21 February 2001, five months ahead of schedule, and deliveries to launch customer Mesa Airlines began in 2003, comprising an initial batch of 25 aircraft. An enhanced CRJ900 NextGen variant, offering up to 5.5 percent lower fuel consumption than earlier-build CRJ900s, was delivered to American Airlines Group's PSA Airlines subsidiary from June 2014. Production of the whole CRJ family passed to Mitsubishi Heavy Industries' MHI RJ Aviation Group when that company completed its acquisition of the CRJ programme on 1 June 2020, with Bombardier continuing to build aircraft against the existing order backlog. The final Bombardier-built CRJ of any type, a CRJ900, was delivered to SkyWest Airlines on 28 February 2021, closing out a CRJ family production run of 1,945 aircraft.
The CRJ900 shares its basic layout with the CRJ700 but uses a longer fuselage, wider wings fitted with leading-edge slats, and a redesigned tail, along with a recirculation fan to aid cabin heating and cooling. It shares a type rating with the CRJ700, and pilots can move between the two types via a three-day cross-crew qualification course. The flight deck uses a Rockwell Collins Pro Line 4 six-tube EFIS suite paired with an Engine Indication and Crew Alerting System, a Flight Dynamics HGS 2000 head-up guidance display, Rockwell Collins AHRS, and Rockwell Collins digital weather radar. Power comes from two General Electric CF34-8C5 turbofans, each rated at around 13,400 lb of thrust. The aircraft has a length of 118 ft 11 in (36.2 m), a wingspan of 81 ft 7 in (24.9 m), a height of about 24 ft 10 in (7.6 m), a wing area of roughly 765 sq ft (71.1 sq m) and a fuselage diameter of 8 ft 10 in (2.69 m). Maximum takeoff weight is 84,500 lb (38,330 kg), against an operating empty weight of 48,160 lb (21,845 kg) and a maximum payload of 22,590 lb (10,247 kg).
The CRJ900 cruises at speeds of around 515 mph (829 km/h), with a quoted high-speed cruise of 475 knots (547 mph; 881 km/h; Mach 0.83). Across the CRJ700-series family this equates to a cruise range of roughly Mach 0.78 to Mach 0.825. Range for the CRJ900 is quoted at 1,550 nmi (2,871 km; 1,780 mi), with a service ceiling of 41,000 ft. Takeoff distance at sea level, ISA conditions and maximum takeoff weight falls in the 5,800-6,290 ft (1,770-1,920 m) range typical of the CRJ700 series.
The base CRJ900 seats up to 90 passengers. An enhanced CRJ900 NextGen model was introduced from 2014, offering up to 5.5 percent lower fuel burn than the earlier-build aircraft, and was delivered first to PSA Airlines on behalf of American Airlines Group. A CRJ900LR long-range model was also offered. To satisfy airline scope-clause restrictions on regional jet seating, Bombardier produced the CRJ705, a CRJ900 limited to 75 passenger seats. The CRJ900 itself formed the basis for the further-stretched CRJ1000, originally launched in February 2007 as the CRJ-900X.
The CRJ900 has been operated widely by regional airline partners flying under the branding of major network carriers, including Air Canada, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Endeavor Air, Mesa Airlines, PSA Airlines and SkyWest Airlines. Along with the rest of the CRJ series, it was a major contributor to North American regional jet flying, with the CRJ family accounting for over 20 percent of all jet departures in North America in 2015. Barring life-extension maintenance programmes, CRJ900 airframes are limited to 60,000 flight cycles. The type remained in production until the very end of the Bombardier-built CRJ programme, with the last aircraft off the line, a CRJ900, handed over to SkyWest Airlines on 28 February 2021.
Because the CRJ900 shares a common type rating and cockpit philosophy with the CRJ700, transitioning between the two requires only a short cross-crew qualification course, and this commonality carries over into how the aircraft is generally approached by pilots and simmers alike. The flight deck's Rockwell Collins Pro Line 4 EFIS suite, together with the Flight Dynamics head-up guidance display fitted to many aircraft, gives the type a distinctly regional-airliner character rather than that of a full mainline jet. As the definitive 76-90 seat regional jet flown by North American feeder carriers, the CRJ900 is well suited in the simulator to short-to-medium-haul regional network flying, replicating the bread-and-butter operations of airlines such as SkyWest, Endeavor Air and PSA Airlines.
