Bombardier’s Global 7000 long-range business jet flew for the first time Friday at Bombardier’s assembly plant at its private airport in Toronto. The aircraft took off from Downsview for a two-hour, 27-minute flight that went to 20,000 feet and 276 mph. "With today's first flight successfully completed, all teams remain focused on meeting the program's development and certification schedule and the aircraft's entry-into-service in the second half of 2018,” said Michel Ouellette, the Bombardier VP in charge of the program.

The Global 7000 and the slightly smaller but longer-range Global 8000 were announced in 2010 and were to have been in service by 2016 and 2017 respectively. The aircraft will be built at the Toronto plant but most of the testing will be done at Bombardier’s facilities in Wichita, which has better winter weather than Toronto. The 7000 will have an opening list price of $72.8 million and the 8000 will cost $56.9 million. Both are derivatives of the Global 6000.