China’s C919 passenger jet completes first commercial flight from Shanghai to Beijing

“This is the first large aircraft made by China and I know it’s meaningful, because my family is also involved in the aviation industry,” he said.

“I had to be here to witness everything, so I signed up for today’s flight in February and got the opportunity to take the return flight.”

There will also be a regular C919 service from Monday between Shanghai and Chengdu, capital of China’s southwestern province of Sichuan.

At a ceremony to launch the flight on Sunday, China Eastern general manager Li Yangmin said: “The safety, reliability and abilities needed to ensure [the plane’s] performance have all been fully proved.”

Designed to compete with the Boeing 737 and the Airbus A320 family of single-aisle aircraft, the C919 has been hailed by state media as a demonstration of China’s technological abilities.

Airbus and Boeing offered their congratulations on the flight via social media.

Manufactured by state-owned Commercial Aviation Corporation of China (Comac), the 38.9-metre (about 127 feet) long and 11.95-metre high aircraft features eight business and 156 economy class seats, according to CCTV. Three pilots were to be on board and the plane was to cruise at a speed of 0.78 mach, or about 955km/h (593mph), it said earlier.

The special in-flight menu for the inaugural trip included claypot rice, mango pudding and chocolate shortbread, as well as White Rabbit Creamy Candy, a hallmark of Shanghai.

The C919 attracted nationwide attention after the announcement of the domestic aircraft development programme in 2007. However, progress was slow.

In 2014, President Xi Jinping visited the Comac office and called for “relentless” efforts to develop and manufacture large passenger aircraft, calling them “an important symbol of a country’s aviation level and an important sign of its overall strength”.

The C919 was unveiled to the public the next year and it completed its first test flight in 2017.

In September last year, the C919 was cleared by China’s aviation regulator to run commercial passenger operations, with a production certificate following two months later.