I had intently followed this plane and how it was manufactured in documentaries and I was amazed by how big it was and the fact that it could actually fly. To date, this is my favorite plane of all time. It feels very spacious on the inside, it is extremely quiet in the cabin and even turbulence that I have experienced felt like a small speed bump. I really hope that airlines can find a way to keep this engineering marvel for as long as possible.
- It is Huge: The A380 has a maximum takeoff weight of almost 1.3 million pounds — as much as seven Boeing 737-800s or 30 percent more than the biggest 747 models. It’s the only airplane flying today with a full-length upper deck. It can carry up to 600 gallons of water, feeding the onboard showers as well as the standard bathrooms and galleys. Its maximum fuel capacity is over 85,000 gallons, or about the same as 5,300 Toyota Camrys.
- It has 330 Miles of Wires. A380s are built in Toulouse, France, but their parts come from all over Europe (and beyond today’s commercial jets are truly globalized products). The wings and Rolls-Royce engines are made in the UK, the fuselage in Germany as well as France, and the horizontal tail plane in Spain — all of this comes together by ship and truck and is assembled within painstakingly designed and enforced tolerance parameters.
- It can fly for a long time: You will have plenty of time to enjoy the bar on the fourth-longest nonstop flight in the world, Emirates’ Auckland-to-Dubai route, the longest A380 flight currently scheduled. It spends on average about 17 hours in the air.
- Typical seating for three classes is 525, but in a one-class seating configuration, the A380 can hold as many as 853 passengers.
- It’s called the A380 because the cross-section of the fuselage looks like the number “8”.
- Only 20 runways in the world are now fully capable of handling A380 aircraft. Others are not long or wide enough or not technically equipped for A380.
