Air International — September 2017

COMMERCIAL DASSAULT FALCON 5X

T

he latest addition to

Dassault’s long-running

Falcon business jet

product line, the Falcon

5X, completed its  rst

 ight from the company’s

Bordeaux-Mérignac

facility in southern France

on July 5, 2017.

The maiden  ight

of the  rst prototype of the new jet,

F-WFVX, took place two years later than

originally scheduled when the Falcon 5X

was launched in 2013. This was a result of

what Dassault terms “design issues” with

the aircraft’s Snecma Silvercrest engines

that have caused a signi cant delay to the

powerplant’s development and, in turn,

affected Dassault’s timetable for bringing the

latest Falcon to market.

Large Cabin

The Falcon 5X is designed to carry 12 to 14

passengers and its range will be 5,200nm

(9,630km). This is 1,250nm (2,315km) less

than the 6,450nm (11,945km) capability of

the ultra-long-range Falcon 8X, the  agship

Falcon family member delivered to its initial

customers in 2016.

Even so, assuming an eight-passenger

load and a Mach 0.85 cruise speed, the

Falcon 5X will still be able to  y non-

stop between city pairs such as New

York–Moscow, London–Miami, Geneva–

Johannesburg and Beijing–Seattle.

However, what differentiates this Falcon

is not its range but its interior. At 1.98m (6ft

6in) in height by 2.58m (8ft 6in) in width, the

Falcon 5X cabin is the largest of any Falcon

New technologies abound in the Dassault Falcon 5X business jet,

fl own for the fi rst time recently, as Mark Broadbent explains

Falcon 5X