Learjet production goes silent after six decades

The Learjet brand has stepped into the sunset, with the famed business jet manufacturer delivering its final aircraft on 28 March. The Wichita airframer, a division of Bombardier, delivered the last jet – an eight-passenger Learjet 75 – to US customer Northern Jet Management, bringing some 60 years of production to a close. During those decades, Learjet produced more than 3,000 aircraft, of which more than 2,000 remain in service, Bombardier says. The move follows Bombardier’s decision, disclosed in February 2021, to shutter Learjet and focus all its attention on producing larger, more-profitable business jets. Launched by innovator Bill Lear in the early 1960s, Learjet quickly became a cultural icon – a symbol of luxury associated with customers like Elvis Presley and Frank Sinatra. Learjet’s first model – the six-passenger Learjet 23 – took to the skies on its maiden flight on 7 October 1963. The airframer went on to produce six- and eight-passenger models like Learjet 24s, 25s, 31s and 35s. Change came in 1990 with Learjet’s acquisition by Bombardier, which backed the airframer’s development of types like Learjet 40s, 45s, 60s, and, more recently, the 70/75 pairing, which entered service last decade. But the company fumbled last decade with its Learjet 85, a composite-skinned aircraft that was to propel Learjet into the era of advanced materials. Amid delays and production problems, Bombardier cancelled the 85 programme in 2015.<br/>