The End of the A380

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fountainhall

The End of the A380

Post by fountainhall »

I find this sad. Airbus has announced it will cease production of the A380 in 2021. Orders have been progressively thin. Without Emirates and its huge A380 fleet, I suspect it might have died earlier.

I always assumed that internal mass markets like China where air travel is mushrooming would be ideal for the A380 in the same way that the many Boeing 747s were adapted to accommodate a gazillion passengers on internal Japan flights (some had as many as 660 economy passengers!). No doubt the economics of a 4-engine monster have been overcome by the much more fuel efficient 2-engine 787s and A350s. Yet airlines need two of these aircraft to carry almost the same number of passengers as the A380 (Emirates 2 class version carries 615).

Last autumn I saw these on three consecutive bays at Hong Kong. I suppose over the years this will become an increasingly rare sight.

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