What a fantastic experience we all just had....
EK really pulled out the stops for us, with senior level staff joining the tour (for some it was their first time seeing parts of the training facility also)

We are the first non-airline industry people to experience using the emergency slide from the top deck of the A380

A simulated emergency landing got us all talking, and a cabin depressurisation vividly indicated potential scenarios for the air travel we all do.

having a crew member yelling "brace, stay down" every 3 seconds whilst the cabin lights are malfunctioning and everything around is making strange noises will stay with me for a long time.

A huge, huge thanks must go to all the EK team who gave up part of their weekend to entertain and educate us, they all seemed to enjoy it and several made mention that some of the feedback FT members gave them will be passed up the chain...... it's rare to feel like a big company is actually listening when you say something, today EK did just that.

Thanks also to Simon, without his persistance, this would probably nevver have happened..... other national carriers now have a lot to live up to if FT visit!!

Anyway, enough waffle.... here's some photos of the day - these were all taken in areas sanctioned by EK (obviously there were several areas that we couldn't photograph, but hopefully these will give those who missed the day something of a taster)

The frontage of the training centre



The reason we're all here, listening to the introduction from Brian, the head of Skywards



The initial area that all new inductees start from, like a set from a futuristic movie!



A quick briefing about the slides, with EKs water escape training tank behind.



The cabin de-pressurisation experience.... the masks really do appear "from a panel above your heads"!!



Simulating the turbulance that caused the lack of pressure, the blurring of the photo shows how rough it was.... at Simon's insistance we got the turbulance cranked to the max!!



From the top of the evac slide on the upper deck of the 380... the height is correct and it really is that steep!



One of 'C' group experiencing the slide, wearing cotton overalls as the biggest danger on these slides comes from friction burns.



Looking into the cockpit / flight sim room.... at a min of $25m each there's a fair amount of cash tied up here... in use 24/7 so sadly no ability for us to try our hand at landing a 380 lol



Last stop on the tour, a quick look at the new fire training chamber, so new they couldn't actually demonstrate it as the gas hasn't been hooked up yet, but it can simulate cabin fires in a number of different areas and the crew do full training in it.... I think we were all glad that we didn't get put through this one!