As someone with limited knowledge into airplane engineering/certifications, on the surface that seems wrong.
I understand (I think) that they made changes to make it essentially handle and act like the 737 therefore it can apply to the same certificate, but surely there should be some kind of time restriction on a certificate applying to new models - even ones that are "similar".
Can someone illuminate me as to why this does or does not make sense?
Boils down to money. A brand new type certificate for a big passenger jet is in the hundreds of millions of dollars in time and money. Therefore you can justify spending quite a lot on lobbying (actual and metaphorical) to get away with reusing one.
Edit: And the airlines will lobby on your behalf too. They don't want to have to certify pilots on a new type, or have yet another split of who can fly what.
I understand (I think) that they made changes to make it essentially handle and act like the 737 therefore it can apply to the same certificate, but surely there should be some kind of time restriction on a certificate applying to new models - even ones that are "similar".
Can someone illuminate me as to why this does or does not make sense?