China's own aircraft prepares to take off next year

[SHANGHAI] The cavernous building that will house the final assembly line of China's own passenger plane is virtually empty, except for an enormous Chinese flag and slogans to rally the workers who will one day produce the C919.

It is a huge engineering challenge but, if the project proceeds on schedule, a prototype of the single-aisle plane will take to the skies by the end of next year.

Its mission is to compete with US aircraft maker Boeing's 737 and the A320 of European consortium Airbus.