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Airbus A380 Completes Maiden Test Flight

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the we-may-experience-a-little-turbulence-people dept.

crazy blade writes "The much anticipated maiden test flight of the Airbus A380 jumbo jet is underway. The aircraft left Blagnac International Airport in Toulouse, France at 10.29 hours local time (08.29 UTC) from runway 32L. Here are some photos if you're interested."

8 of 890 comments (clear)

  1. fuel efficiency by digitaldc · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Now that fuel costs are through the roof, Europe will HAVE to subsidize the A380 in order to keep ticket costs down.
    I heard the bathrooms on the A380 will be big enough to sit down in, and you will now get a 4 oz. bag of peanuts instead of the usual 0.5 oz bag.
    Please take a moment to locate the emergency exits in case of a water landing, we have provided a map of the plane's interior in case you get lost.

    --
    He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
  2. In a related story... by dfn5 · · Score: 0, Flamebait
    ... the Bush administration has put in an order to upgrade Airforce 1 with an A380 to impress his Saudi buddies when he flies into town.

    --
    -- Thou hast strayed far from the path of the Avatar.
  3. Re:Is any work being done to make engines efficien by TheKidWho · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    I wait for the day when they ban SUVs and nothing changes... What will the extremist liberals whine about next?

  4. Re:When will India/China/Brazil/Russia enter the r by downward+dog · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Wonder why none of them produces large commercial jets?

    Part of the reason is that the world's economy can only support a few passenger jet manufacturers. Remember McDonnell Douglas and Concorde? The market had a hard time supporting three-and-a-half major manufacturers.

    It is possible, of course, that China/India/Brazil/Russia could support a new player that produced planes more efficiently (cheaply), which would probably hurt Boeing or Airbus substantially.

  5. Re:When will India/China/Brazil/Russia enter the r by ghoul · · Score: 1, Flamebait

    What I really meant was when will these planes have a market share comparable to Airbus and Boing? I am a little surprised as everyone knows the Russians have always been ahead of the west in fighter plane technology just like the west has been ahead in aircraft carriers( For the patriotic its not about brains its about funding priorities).
    Given this lead in fighter tech the fact that Russia/Ukraine/other ex-SSRs are not able to market their planes abroad better

    --
    **Life is too short to be serious**
  6. Re:Bigger than Howard Hughes' dream by corngrower · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    One article stated that 35 cars could fit on the wing of this new Airbus. If those are french cars, I'm not impressed.

  7. Re:When will India/China/Brazil/Russia enter the r by masklinn · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    It's been proven that the concordski was a ripoff of one of the early designs of Concorde, it was unstable (which is why that draft was trashed/reworked in the first place), concordski never made it to production status and was promptly dropped while Concorde actually got to carry passengers (until Gonesse, that is)

    Even if that hadn't been a ripoff thanks to industrial spies, a plane that never managed to fly reliably couldn't be branded 'first supersonic passenger jet', at best it could be the 'first supersonic passenger jet failure'

    --
    "The way we can tell it's C# instead of Haskell is because it's nine lines instead of two." -- wadler
  8. ahh, but . . . by hawk · · Score: 0, Flamebait
    It can fit 70 french cars on that same wing after they hit Chevies . . .

    :)

    hawk