Austral Lineas Aereas, from Argentina, signed for 20 EMBRAER 190 jets. The contract will go into effect after fulfilling certain requirements, and that should take place within two months. Delivery is expected to begin in the first semester of 2010.
The airplanes will be the AR (Advanced Range) model, which allows flights of up to 2,400 nautical miles (4,400 km), and will have a comfortable dual-class 96-seat configuration. Austral plans to use the EMBRAER 190 jets mainly to ramp up its frequencies on domestic routes, with the potential of opening new markets thus allowing the airline to fly nonstop routes inside Argentina, as well as destinations in South America.