A380 formation flight

[Datalink 26]

For those that haven't seen it or heard about it, 4 A380's performed a formation flight yesterday over the Med and southern France. I just checked the A380 Navigator site, and they have a couple of pictures and a short video clip:http://www.airbus.com/store/photolibrary/A...ic4_320X240.swfhttp://events.airbus.com/A380/default1.aspxWhat an amazing sight! :D

[Mace 1,918]

Wow! I hope Airbus knows what they're doing with such a massive airplane. And those engines are massive, too. I've never heard of EngineAlliance. Is this some new company, or a spinoff of CFM or IAE or one of those?Are those engines bigger diameter than a 777's engine?RhettAMD 3700+ powered by Gerbil wheel + gerbil, eVGA 7800GT 256, ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 gigs Corsair TWINX, blah blah, etc. etc.

[Datalink 26]

Airbus regularly do formation flights for photo shoots, mainly with the smaller jets mind you, but i guess the principles are the same.Yes EngineAlliance is a joint venture, its between GE and PW, using the best of both engines. I still prefer the RR though :-lol I believe the engines are the same size, or just a bit bigger than those on the 777. I stood next to a mock up at the Farnborough airshow in 2004, and all I can say is they are huge!

[jagabom 21]

Good one. Excellent commercial. Hope Boeing is going to try to top it.JimCYWG

[btacon 1,789]

Fantastic. Thanks for sharing. Ain't technology grand!Now, I was thinking as I was watching those 4 behemoths taxi out, "Why would any carrier buy an A/C that currently a majority of airports cannot accommodate? Can you land an A380 in Edinburgh Scotland? I doubt it.I think Airbus bet the farm on this one...the results remain to be seen. Regardless...fantastic video of some fantastic aircraftbt

[Guest oyvindhansen]

"Why would any carrier buy an A/C that currently a majority of airports cannot accommodate?"Because if you are a longhaul airline like Singapore or Emirates, your main business is already based around the airports that CAN accomodate the A380, and you'd like to squeeze even more passengers through those airports. You wouldn't be able to find enough passengers to regularly fill a 380 in Edinburgh anyway, so why go there?But, at less than full load I think the A380 should be able to use the same airports that can accomodate a 747. The design has huge wings that keeps takeoff and landing speeds down. Not every flight needs to have 800 passengers and maximum fuel you know. But anyway, the aircraft is specifically intended to be used on the busiest and longest routes, which happen to be between the very largest international airports. Unfortunately there are only so many routes of that type, so I guess we'll have to wait and see how it plays out.-

[Cessnaflyer 56]

I think the problem is more of a size factor not a runway length factor. Most airports designed taxiways, concourses, etc. off of the 747 then made the areas just big enough to manuver it around. At the time everyone thought that the 747 would be the largest around so then they maximized the space for that size.

[Guest Eek]

They won't be landing in Atlanta and a lot of other places, simply because the airports aren't built for a plane that size, and the costs to accomodate it outweigh the benefits.Here's an article: http://www.usatoday.com/travel/news/2005-0...s-atlanta_x.htm~EwingKATLMSI K8N Neo2 PlatinumAMD Athlon 64 3200+ 2.0 GHz2GB Corsair PC-3200 512x4 Dual Channel CL2.5 DDR DIMM eVGA nVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT 256MB DDR3Sound Blaster Audigy LSOCZ Powerstream 420WWinXPPro (SP1)

[Guest jboweruk]

I was lucky enough to see the real deal at Farnborough this year, and what a sight that lady is. She is big yes, but so maneoverable, just a joy to watch when they were hauling her around for the display.