Private suites and comfort showers in First Class, completely reclining seats in Business Class, extra space and personalized lighting in Economy Class as well as WiFi on board for all the classes: with A380 of Emirates it will be like travelling in a private jet.
The Airbus A380, produced by Airbus Industries is a four-engine double deck airliner, which can carry 853 persons in charter version, 525 in the typical three classes version. The first trial flight took place the 27th of April 2005. The first delivery was done the 15th of October 2007 to Singapore Airlines, that the 25th of October carried out the first commercial flight from Singapore to Sydney. The ticket for this first flight costed between 535 to 100.000 dollars for the suites and mini suites.
The A380, known for many years during its development phase as Airbus A3XX, is the biggest airliner, for dimensions. Only the Boeing 747-8 intercontinental and A340-600 exceed in lenght respectively of 3.4 and 2.6 meters. In spite of that A380 remains the first for biggest number of passengers.
Till now have been delivered airliners to Singapore Airlines (19), Emirates (33), Qantas (12), Air France (8), Lufthansa (10), Korean Air (6), China Southern (5), Malaysia Airlines (6) e Thai Airways (4). At the end of 2013 have been delivered the first models to British Airways and Qatar Airways as well.
In July 2004, Etihad Airways bought four Airbus A380 with delivery in 2007, in the same moment when the first prototypes of A380 started to be built in the assembling factory of Toulouse.
The A380 has been presented with a cerimony in Toulouse the 18th of January 2005. The airliner that was unveiled in the French factory was named MSN 001 ("Manufacturer's Serial No. 001") and registered as F-WWOW.
After the first trials with only crew on board, the 4th of September 2006 took off from Toulouse the first flight with passengers on board with the goal to test the comfort conditions inside the plane. The 474 "guinea pigs" passengers were employees of Airbus Company and offered themselves as volunteers. This first simulation of a line flight, with the arrival in the same Toulouse airport lasted around seven hours.
The new Airbus was initially foreseen in two versions: the A380-800 able to carry 525 passengers in the three class standard configuration for 15.700 Km., and the A380-800F air freight, able to carry 150 tons of cargo for 10.400 Km. Nevertheless, due to difficuties and delays during the production of the first models of the passenger version, the development of the cargo version was first delayed and then suspended with the consequent cancellation of the orders from the side of operators (UPS and FedEx).
Capacity
The airbus A380 can be used in 3 configurations:
§ Charter, for 853 passengers
§ Classic configuration, three classes with 525 passengers
§ 2 classes, with 645 passengers
Size
The Airbus A380 is 72.72 meters long and has a wingspan of 79.75 meters. The capacity is 90.800 Kg. and its tank can contain 323.546 liters of fuel. It has 2 decks. The maximum width of the cabin on the main deck is 6.53 meters, whereas the secondary cabin is 5.74 meters large. The lenght of the cabin on the Airbus A380 is 49.90 meters. Even if planes as the Boeing 747-8 Intercontinetal and Airbus A340-600 are longer of 3.4 and 2.6 meters, the Airbus A380 is however at the moment the plane which can carry the biggest number of passengers.
Engine
The Airbus A380 is pushed by 4 engines, that for some companies are Rolls-Royce Trent 900 turbojet engines or Engine Alliance GP7200.
To pilot the Airbus A380 are necessary 2 pilots, that in the cockpit have to their disposal the berths for the captain as well. On board of the plane are employed 22 flight attendants.
Performance
The Airbus A380 can reach the maximum speed of 1.176 Km/h equal 0.96 Mach, whereas its cruise speed is equal to 1.041 Km/h i.e. 0.85 Mach.
Airbus A380 on duty
At present 103 Airbus A380 are in use in the following air companies:
8 Air France
5 China Southern Airlines
33 Emirates Airlines
6 Korean Air
10 Lufthansa
6 Malaysia Airlines
12 Qantas
19 Singapore Airlines
4 Thai Airways International
Price
The price of the biggest plane in the world is 403.9 millions USD dollars
The structure was purposely built for the biggest fleet of A380 in the world.
The dedicated hub for A380 at the Terminal 3 of Emirates is the only one in the world of this kind.
Its purpose is to trasform the travel experience giving to its visitors the possibility of quicker embarkations, simplier connections and more comfort.
