Check out the airbus website..the fueslage is just simply massive! yes Star alliance members are among the first customers....yvr is upgrading to accomodate but Korean Airlines was in the news recently stating that they were likely to convert at least 3 of their A380 order to cargo only and SIA can always allocate to their cargo devision as well...
...regardless, I cant wait to get on one of them!
6 April 2004
A380 CUSTOMERS
To date, Airbus has received 129 orders from 11 customers
A380 customers to date are (by alphabetical order):
Air France: 10
Emirates: 43, including two freighters
Federal Express: 10 freighters
International Lease Finance Corporation: five A380s and five A380 freighters
versus over 600 for the 747 by the end of the decade*. Just doubt that YVR will truly be among one of them.
* Read this in some recent news release in the past 2 weeks. IIRC, it was an EADS/Airbus presentation to NYC analysts. Only some 22 airports worldwide will truly be able to accomodate the A380 (not just the gates/parking/taxi area) but the ability of thse parts to bear the weight) by 2008-2010. Compare this to the 600+ airports that the 747 can and do operate into.
which airports are going to be able to handle these a/c. I'm assuming YVR, YYZ and YUL in canada. In the states i'm guessing LAX, JFK, ORD, MSP. In europe, LHR, FRA, AMS, and in asia, NRT, HKG, SIN, KIX and SYD
Add Memphis to your list as well, although MEM only needs the runways to handle them, not the gate space, as FedEx parks all their birds on an open tarmac.
Although I do understand that only the newest landing strip in MEM is wide enought to land the plane.
Runway width is an apparant issue due to the placement of the engines outside the "standard" 150 foot width of most runways Even though the wingspan is within standards (just). Probably a much bigger issue than weight, this puppy does wieght a lot, almost but not quite as much as the AN-225 but that is still only 1/3 as much again as the biggest 747-400.
Istn't there a list of airports prepared for the A380 on the Airbus-Homepage??? It could be it's in one of the linked PDF-Docs, but I remember reading it.
Would deep snow on the sides or outer edges of the runways be a factor here with A380's wide wingspan? (as in slush-ingestion into huge high-thrust engines)
