First impressions Airbus 380
Last week I had a chance to get a close look at the new Airbus 380 when it landed to fanfare at Orlando on a tour of select American airports. Together with a band of around 20 journalists, I clambered through its passenger areas and sat on the flight deck. The experience was surprisingly anticlimactic after reading so much about the massive plane and so much anticipation.
I was expecting an airplane that would change the experience of flying. What I discovered when the plane landed at Orlando and the doors swung open was an aircraft that will not be changing the flying experience, but will certainly change the logistics and problems of flight for everyone.
Interestingly, the A380 for all of its size looks like a fat cigar from about a hundred yards. There is none of the elegance of the Concorde. There is nothing sleek about the craft. It will not inspire dreams other than for accountants and airline executives who, hopefully, will see per passenger costs drop. I think they refer to this as passenger seat mile costs. Time will certainly tell as several foreign airlines are in the process of integrating the A380s into their fleets.
For all of the hoopla about a “New Way of Flying” the Airbus experience seems bigger, but not positively different. From the inside, the new Airbus doesn’t seem any different from a Boeing 747. In fact it is only around a foot and a half wider than the 747 and the seating seems about the same based on the configuration of the A380 that landed in Orlando. The big difference comes naturally with the addition of the upper deck that stretches the length of the plane. The floor space with this additional deck is almost 50 percent more than a 747.
But there are no soaring ceilings, not long views down the fuselage, no showy sweeping staircases, no glistening railings, no crystal chandeliers, no mahogany bars for the hoi polloi. I didn’t have a chance to measure, but the windows didn’t seem any larger than those on the Airbus 320 that carried me to Orlando. I know the Boeing folk have focused on larger windows to change the passenger experience in their coming 787.
If the passenger experience in the air is still more or less the same, where will the passengers experience the “new way of flying”? I hate to be a naysayer, but past experience has been a good predictor of future experiences. When bad systems that are currently creaking under the weight of today’s public are forced to handle additional people, they rarely work better. Passengers will have to deal with longer boarding procedures and extended baggage claim waits. TSA will have longer lines, customs agents will screen more passports and visas, caterers will face new magnitudes of scale and baggage handlers will sort far more luggage.
Passengers should get ready to develop a strong case of patience before the airports and TSA gets the bugs worked out of the system.
This airplane will be perfect for transporting cargo. FexEx and UPS will have a field day with savings over the long run. It will also probably be effectively used with the hub-and-spoke systems that airline alliances currently use. And it will be good news for the few non-hub destination airports like Orlando where it can provide additional capacity for foreign tourists. But the A380 will not be changing the world of travel. It will only change the economies of scale.
My crystal ball sees the Boeing 787 making the world a better place for point-to-point travel. Just as Southwest’s focus on point-to-point travel changed the domestic airline world, Boeing’s new plane will make point-to-point profitable for international travel and far easier for passengers as they have a chance to land at smaller airports and travel without changing planes.
The A380 on the other hand may add to the airlines’ bottom line, however it will only make the passenger experience worse unless the support systems for this massive plane make significant changes. I don’t see that happening anytime soon.
Photos of plane exterior courtesy Airbus. Photo of interior by Leocha.
You may also be interested in these articles
Comments
Please share your thoughts...