NEW DELHI: The world's largest passenger aircraft A-380 touched down for the first time in India on Sunday to mark the second anniversary celebrations of Kingfisher Airlines.
This fully double decker aircraft, which landed at 10.50 a.m., has a passenger capacity of 850 seats in all economy configurations but in three classes it has the capacity to carry about 550 passengers.
Kingfisher Airlines has ordered five A-380 planes which has a list price of over 300 million dollars per aircraft.
Super jumbo aircraft is powered by four Trent engine manufactured by Rolls Royce and can fly 15,000 kilometres non-stop.
During its India visit, it would be taking some VIPs on a flight of fancy over Delhi and on Tuesday it will fly off to Mumbai.
Airports Authority of India and advance teams of Airbus Industrie had been on the job in Delhi to prepare for various facilities including navigation of the super jumbo plane in the country which takes three Boeing 737 or Airbus 320 space.
This 80 feet tall aircraft will be fly flying off from Mumbai on May 9.
The wingspan of an A320 aircraft is 34.1 metres while A380 is 79.8 metres. The turnaround time of this world's largest plane is 90 minutes (with over 500 passengers).
Delivery of A-380 has been delayed because of changes in wiring was required which took a couple of months resulting in the loss of about three billion dollars to Airbus.
The first A-380 will be deployed in regular commercial service with Singapore Airlines later this year and Kingfisher is expected to get the planes in 2011.
The A380, sold in two versions, has a range of 8,000 nautical miles.
The second model, the A380-800F freighter, will carry 150 tonnes of cargo for 5,600 nautical miles.
The A380 has a Maximum Take-Off Weight (MTOW) of 590T, compared with Boeing 747-400ER has a MTOW of 412T.
The project was estimated to cost around Euro 8.8 billion in 1999, however the final budget is Euro 12 billion due to the delays.
The delay was caused by a technical snag in the aircraft's wiring which required the Airbus Industrie to change about 500 kms of wires inside the aircraft.
To-date, 166 A380s have been ordered by 16 customers, with the first delivery taking place before the end of this year.
The A380 has completed a highly successful series of route proving flights, underscoring the aircraft's ability to operate at gateways around the world while also generating excitement that comes with the introduction of a new way to fly.
These latest evaluations involved the participation of A380 customer Lufthansa and were focused primarily on the United States, with the aircraft making visits to New York, Chicago and Washington. The aircraft also visited several countries in Asia including Singapore, UAE and Hong Kong.
The A380 has provided impressive demonstrations of the aircraft's low noise levels, excellent manoeuvrability and interoperability with various airport runways, taxiways and terminal facilities, Airbus sources said.
Two A380s make history with near-simultaneous arrivals in New York and Los Angeles this March.
