Chinese commercial-aircraft builder Comac will deliver the first ARJ21 regional jet in May 2010, slipping the schedule from 2009 as the aircraft enters its delayed flight tests. The aircraft, China’s first advanced jetliner, made its first flight on Nov. 28, eight months later than scheduled at its rollout a year ago and two years later than planned when the project was launched.

The proposed merger of Qantas and British Airways is attracting minimal opposition in Australia, improving the chances of a successful deal. The Australian government looks like treating the proposal to form a dual-listed company to combine the airlines as a purely commercial matter that it would not obstruct. Negotiations are at too early a stage for Canberra to consider the deal formally under foreign investment laws, but the government’s statements so far reveal no sign of any nationalist urge to block such a deal.

The Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) is stepping up its lobbying efforts for a full order of 100 F-35 Lightning IIs, a number that has been officially endorsed but could easily be trimmed in a defense white paper due next year. The chief of the air force, Air Marshal Mark Binskin, strongly defends the choice of Lockheed Martin’s F-35 as its next fighter, arguing that it will be part of an integrated airpower system and the country could not hope to find better.