Let's have a look at Every Jetliner Ever Made, in alphabetical order, but with Airbus and Boeing at the end because the list would be incredibly front-loaded otherwise. Today we're going to look at Embraer, of Brazil, where we stood beneath an amber moon, and softy murmured "some day soon".
Embraer (Brazil)
Up until the mid 1960s Brazil's aviation industry relied on foreign designs, such as the Savoia-Marchetti S55 flying boat and the Lockheed Electra pictured on the stamps at the top of the page. The Brazilian government decided it was high time to kickstart the country's domestic aviation industry, so it issued a specification for a light turboprop transport with a view to military and commercial sales.
A team led by French import Max Holste came up with a sleek, low-winged design, which was eventually called the Bandeirante, or Pioneer. It was named after the 16th- and 17th-century bandeirantes, who had ventured into the Brazilian interior in order to peacefully persuade the local inhabitants to work on farms and worship the correct God. The bandeirante are controversial nowadays and I suspect that if the aircraft had been designed in the modern age it would have a different name.
The aircraft's design process was similar to the Soviet method, whereby the prototype was constructed by Brazil's leading technical bureau, with a plan for a separate company to carry out series production. However the private sector failed to step up, and so a chap called Ozires Silva was asked to set up a state-owned aviation manufacturer, which became the Empresa Brasileira de Aeronáutica, or Embraer for short.
The resulting EMB 110 Bandeirante was a sleek, low-wing turboprop, not a million miles from the Handley-Page Jetstream or the Fairchild Metroliner. It went on to sell around five hundred units internationally. It was the very first aircraft of Irish low-cost airline Ryanair, who flew it from Waterford in Ireland to London Gatwick. Embraer continued to have success with turboprops over the coming decades, but in 1989 the company decided to take things up with a notch with a regional jet, the Embraer Regional Jet (ERJ).
Initially the design was very conservative. It was essentially a stretched derivative of the EMB 110, retaining the straight wings and T-tail, but with podded jet engines instead of turboprops. The result was aerodynamically fussy, so Embraer gave it rear-mounted engines instead and a gently swept wing, which ended up mirroring the configuration of the Bombardier CRJ and the Douglas DC-9. The complicated development meant that, although the ERJ had been announced at roughly the same time as the Bombardier CRJ, it entered service four years later, in 1996.
The ERJ was offered in three basic models, the ERJ 135, ERJ 140, and ERJ 145, which carried 37-50 passengers depending on the model. Embraer also built long-range variants with larger fuel tanks. The 50-seat ERJ145 accounted for the majority of sales. Despite the delay in production it managed to keep pace with the CRJ, sales-wise.
Partially this was the result of great timing. In 1992, when the CRJ entered service, smaller airliners were still wary of regional jets, but by the mid-90s turboprops were increasing perceived as being old-hat, and passengers routinely expressed a preference for jets.
The launch airline, Continental Express, was typical of ERJ's customers. In the mid-90s Continental had a fleet of aging turboprops of different types that had been accumulated over the years. Rather than replace them like-for-like the airline decided to switch to regional jets instead, with an order for 200 ERJs. Over time the ERJ also developed an excellent safety record, with ten crashes but no fatalities to date, which is impressive for an airliner designed to make a lot of short flights. ERJs are still routinely used nowadays, with production only ending with the COVID pandemic in 2020.
As is the fashion for regional jet manufacturers, Embraer decided to follow up the success of the ERJ by chasing a slightly larger segment. In 2002 the company launched its next airliner, the E-Jet, which was closer in size and specification to the hugely popular Airbus A320 and Boeing 737, although around two-thirds the size. The original plan was to stretch and re-engineer the ERJ, but perhaps mindful of the delays incurred during the early development of that aircraft Embraer decided on a clean-sheet design instead.
The E-Jet has the same configuration as a full-sized airliner, with a pair of engines under the wings and a conventional tail. It was at the time something of a gamble. Bombardier had toyed with the idea of a miniature full-sized jet in the late 1990s, but decided against it, which meant that the E-Jet was unique when it entered service in 2004. The most popular model turned out to be the Bombardier E-175, which carries 78 passengers, with other models - the stretched E-190 and E-195, and the original E-170 - carrying anything from around 60-100 passengers depending on configuration. Embraer also sold freighter conversions of the E-190.
The E-Jet benefited from a peculiar, US-specific law whereby airlines that have a regional subsidiary are legally obliged to use smaller airliners on that subsidiary, topping out at 76 seats, which was a perfect fit for the E-175. For that reason there was even a specific submodel of the E-175 that eliminated two seats to bring it to the 76-seat maximum.
On the whole the E-Jet benefited from a general inflationary trend in the airliner market, whereby former short-range jets such as the A-320 and 737 have been stretched and re-engined to a point where they can cross the Atlantic, while smaller regional jets have been redeployed as workhorses on trans-European routes.
Production of the original E-Jet continues as of this writing. In 2019 Embraer embarked on talks with Boeing for a possible deal whereby the two companies would team up to make a second-generation E-Jet. The proposal mirrored a similar deal brokered between Airbus and Bombardier that resulted in Bombardier C-Series becoming the Airbus A-220.
However a combination of COVID and Boeing's troubles with a new model of 737 eventually caused the deal to fall apart, at which point Embraer continued as an independent entity. Bombardier, meanwhile, sold its C-Series jet to Airbus, and left the passenger aviation market to concentrate on business jets.
The reason for the talks was the E-Jet E2, which was Embraer's successor to the E-Jet. It was announced in the 2010s and entered service in 2018. The E2 has a similar two-engines-under-the-wing configuration, but with improved aerodynamics and more efficient powerplants. The two models currently in service, the E-190E2 and E-195E2, carry 96 and 120 passengers respectively. Such has been the inflation in aircraft capability over the years that the E2 is actually larger and carries more passengers than the original Douglas DC-9 and Boeing 737, which was why Boeing was so keen on having something that could slot into that section of the market.
Unfortunately for Embraer sales were sluggish, not helped by the COVID pandemic. As of this writing Embraer has sold around one hundred and fifty E2s, much less than the more capacious Airbus A220, but there are around 350 more on the order books, and production is still ongoing. It has yet to land a big order with one of the more glamorous airlines, and only time will tell if it was a stretch too far.
And that's Embraer. Next, Fokker. And VFW-Fokker. And Fairchild. And Fairchild-Dornier. Or possibly just the first two, and then the next two. Or maybe all of them.
