Posted on 04/28/2005 1:42:10 PM PDT by Paleo Conservative
Emirates Airline continues to push Airbus to launch the stretch version of the A380, the proposed dash 900, President Tim Clark told ATWOnline in Dubai.Asked whether he expects Emirates' first A380 to arrive on schedule in October 2006, Clark responded, "I don't know of any aircraft that has been delivered on time to the customer." The most important thing, he said, is that the jet meets Emirates' demanding specifications: "The A380 has to deliver to us 18% lower seat-mile costs compared to our 777-300s." Emirates' A380s will seat 489 in a three-class long-haul configuration, with up to 644 seats in a two-class arrangement for high-density medium-range operations.
The carrier is in the final stages of selecting its future medium-size fleet type and will choose among the A350, 787 and 777-200LR. A decision will be announced later this year. Clark did not say how many aircraft Emirates will order. It currently operates eight A340-500s on long-haul routes and they are performing well, he said, "but we have to consider the 777-200LR. We saw that it is now a much improved aircraft."
On the network side, the carrier this year will open Seoul, Alexandria and Hamburg. Beijing will follow on Feb. 1, 2006. Planned services to San Francisco and Houston have been postponed in favor of adding more flights to New York, Chairman Ahmed bin Saeed Al-Maktoum said during a news conference to discuss the company's financial results. Emirates also is studying the possibility of launching around-the-world service.
Clark does not see the emergence of new competitors such as Etihad and the resurgent Gulf Air as a threat, stating that the market is large enough to sustain them and that these carriers are helping to grow the market.
If you want on or off my aviation ping list, please contact me by Freep mail not by posting to this thread.
There is an article in the WSJ about a whistleblower stating that the aircraft software on the A380 has not been properly tested. Apparently they took other software and adapted it to the new plane, rather than writing a whole new version.
What's so great about having custom software for just one plane? I would be concerned if the software has not been adequately tested on that particular aircraft, but they have about a year to do that.
Can imagine that monster full of fuel, going down after take-off? Back in the 90s, I think it was, one of the bigger Antonovs departed Irkutsk, heavy with fuel and cargo, it crashe right after take off into an apartment complex. The amount of fuel onboard contributed greatly to the casulties and damage..
I might be too pessimistic but I think this tub deserves a berth next to the Spruce Goose.
Hahah, now that's a good one.
Prolly used the same CAD/CAM software used to design other Airbus models, too. Shocking!
The Europeans did this with a rocket some time ago, in developing a larger derivative of an existing rocket. The new rocket used the control software from the older rocket. While the new rocket was being launched, one of the values the controller was tracking overflowed - ran out of digits - which wasn't a problem with the old system because the particular physical measurement was not so large. The controller then made a flight adjustment based on the incorrect data, and the rocket was destroyed by aerodynamic forces less than a minute into its flight.
Overflow - if you have only four decimal digits, then 9999 is your largest number. If you add one, you roll over to 0000 (not 10,000)
I remember one incident I read about… don’t remember if it was a missile or not. Anyhow, everything was hunky-dory as long as it was operating > sea level. But anytime it went where it was possible to go < sea level there were problems. Somebody figured it out though.
But what makes you think that custom software wouldn't have even more bugs?
I will email you the article...sounds like they cut and pasted a bunch of code into the new program, but havent done the quality control on it.
This was a launch from French-Guiana. Landed in the jungle and caused a big mess as well as spreading some radio active contamination. The Frenchies are more concerned with impressions than utility.
There is an article in the WSJ about a whistleblower stating that the aircraft software on the A380 has not been properly tested. Apparently they took other software and adapted it to the new plane, rather than writing a whole new version.
Why not? Worked great on the Ariane-5!
On Feb. 8, a Virgin Atlantic Airways flight to London from Hong Kong with 293 passengers and 18 crew on board made an emergency landing in Amsterdam after bugs in the computerized fuel-management system of the Airbus A340-600 starved one engine of fuel and almost shut down a second. British investigators are still analyzing the "serious incident," but Airbus reprogrammed the system at their urging.
It's a good thing that Airbus had 4 engines.
So that's why my IRA has only $325.00 in it after making contributions for 20 years. My bank needs to trade in their Tandy TRS-80.
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