A380 Makes History With First Flight

[FredGarvin]

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050427/ap_on_re_eu/a380_first_flight_18

Congrats to the A380 folks. Step one of many down.

BTW...20 tons of instrumentation. They are not screwing around with measuring things.

 

[Gonzolo]

Let me guess... 20 tons worth of crash test dummies!

 

[cepheid]

Some tidbits I heard about on the news tonight

73 m long...as long as four standard city buses arranged end to end.
Twice as long as A320

Undercarriage alone is 14 m wide. There is a concern many of the world's major airports might be ill-equipped to handle the plane's width and weight.

Mass: 500 000 kg, I believe.

Wingspan is wide enough that 35 cars placed side by side span it.

Can carry up to 800 passengers, but with only 550 passengers, there is room for some extra amenties such as a lounge, a store, or ...ahem... a casino. (!)


Won't fly commericially for another year, although Airbus has received orders
for 149 of them already.

 

[Pengwuino]

The way they were marketing the thing... with people up and about having some liquor and talken to a friend... id unno, is it just me or do you not see anyone actually doing that in the new airplane lol. From what i hear, people just want to get on and fall asleep lol. I wouldn't mind a bed! and maybe a restaurant... but anything else seems kinda unrealistic.

 

[FredGarvin]

I can't remember the figure off the top of my head but Airbus needs to at least double the orders for a break even point. They went almost $ 2 billion over budget. It will be interesting to see how the aircraft actually work themselves into the system.

 

[cronxeh]

Oh look who ordered most of them http://us.news3.yimg.com/img.news.yahoo.com/util/anysize/345,http%3A%2F%2Fus.news2.yimg.com%2Fus.yimg.com%2Fp%2Fnm%2F20050428%2Fairbus_orders_graphic.gif?v=1

 

[cepheid]

Oh look who ordered most of them http://us.news3.yimg.com/img.news.yahoo.com/util/anysize/345,http%3A%2F%2Fus.news2.yimg.com%2Fus.yimg.com%2Fp%2Fnm%2F20050428%2Fairbus_orders_graphic.gif?v=1

Hahaha! United Arab Emirates huh? That's pretty crazy. But they're spending money like nobody's business as it is. My friend went to Dubai recently, and though he said it was nothing special right now, the developments they're planning will make it one of the most affulent/extravagent tourists cities ever. Things like a hotel partially underwater. I just thought...

Heh...Air Canada conspicuously absent from that list. Not that they could afford it. Mind you, I don't see many American Airlines on there either. Hmm interesting. You think people have reservations about this plane? At least in N. America?

 

[DaveC426913]

Wingspan is wide enough that 35 cars placed side by side span it.

And it's STILL not as big as the Spruce Goose. See http://www.livejournal.com/users/davesbrain/47023.html .
.

 

[Astronuc]

Airbus's http://www.airbus.com/A380/seeing/indexminisite.aspx may be of interest.

 

[Pengwuino]

Heh...Air Canada conspicuously absent from that list. Not that they could afford it. Mind you, I don't see many American Airlines on there either

lol, See: Air Canada

I doubt any american airliner is in a good position to be buying up airplanes. I want to fly in one though just to see hwo many people actually go to the bars and supposed pool table (which doesn't make sense if your... FLYING... so maybe someone was just bsing with me) and other stuff that seems crazy cool. I want to see one land. Must be like a skyscraper turned sideways and flying.

 

[scavok]

lol, See: Air Canada

I doubt any american airliner is in a good position to be buying up airplanes. I want to fly in one though just to see hwo many people actually go to the bars and supposed pool table (which doesn't make sense if your... FLYING... so maybe someone was just bsing with me) and other stuff that seems crazy cool. I want to see one land. Must be like a skyscraper turned sideways and flying.

They said the same crap when the 747 was released. Bars, disco's, gym's, etc. In the end, the interior is entirely up to the airline, and you should have no worries that they'll cram as many seats in that plane as can possibly fit.

 

[Peter.E]

They have a price at $282m and their 154 orders should take them well past their spending cost of $13bn, a nice profit of around $304bn?

 

[Pengwuino]

They have a price at $282m and their 154 orders should take them well past their spending cost of $13bn, a nice profit of around $304bn?

Uhm 1, your missing a decimal in your calculation, and 2, the 282 million is the selling price per aircraft. Who knows how much it costs to actually build one. One estimate said that they need 2x the orders currently in place (which means 300 orders) to break even which means they must cost $238 million to make to sell at that $282 million price.

 

[Pengwuino]

They said the same crap when the 747 was released. Bars, disco's, gym's, etc. In the end, the interior is entirely up to the airline, and you should have no worries that they'll cram as many seats in that plane as can possibly fit.

Beautiful, for a second there i thought i might actually be missing something by not traveling. I wonder how many routes will actaully be able to fill 800-1000 passengers.

 

[Clausius2]

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050427/ap_on_re_eu/a380_first_flight_18

Congrats to the A380 folks. Step one of many down.

BTW...20 tons of instrumentation. They are not screwing around with measuring things.

By the way one of the on board engineers in that first flight was spanish (F. Alonso).

I think Boeing guys must be a bit angry...

 

[Pengwuino]

Well, if it 'takes off' in a figureative sense, I am sure they'll get mad.

LAX spent $28 million outfitting their airport for the Airbus. That means I am near a hub where the A380 will be! but then again its LA... let's see... its either drive through LA or take a great flight on the worlds biggest commercial airplane in luxury... meh, ill stay home :D

 

[FredGarvin]

They are expecting a break even point of 2010 which will equal roughly a run of 250 aircraft. There are a lot of assumptions there with that, like maintaining a production schedule of 1 per week and having another 100+ orders for aircraft.

Here's a very good compare between 747X and A380. It's worth the read:
http://www.aoe.vt.edu/~mason/Mason_f/A380Buescher.pdf

 

[sid_galt]

One thing I noticed about the A380 was that it had two winglets, one with a positive and the other with a negative angle.

\
/

Now I also noticed somewhere on the TV a Boeing plane which had a single winglet which first went down and then up like this

>>\ ____
>>>\/

So what's the advantage of having two winglets? Increased surface area for lift and more control over flight?

Or is it more complicated than that?

 

[FredGarvin]

Here you go:
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19770026168_1977026168.pdf