China’s 10-tonne electric commercial aircraft CE-25A completes first crewed flight

The step from uncrewed to crewed flight is the certification-relevant milestone, not the electric propulsion itself: carrying pilots and a test engineer means the aircraft's intelligent flight systems are being validated with human oversight in the loop. That matters for China's domestic commercial aviation supply chain, where a 10-tonne electric platform would sit in regional and utility roles rather than mainline service. The open question is whether the test cadence from February's uncrewed sortie to this crewed flight is sustained through the longer certification campaign that commercial operation would require.