Sir Tim Clark, the president of Emirates Airlines, was intending to be in Hamburg this week to attend a historic event — the last delivery of an Airbus A380. It would be the 251st from the series and the last one ever built.
A total of 123 have been ordered by the carrier from Dubai. Without all these orders the program would have been shut down years ago. Instead, it was announced in 2019 that production would end in 2021.
Meanwhile, the 72-year-old Clark, an industry legend, didn’t have it easy with his favorite aircraft. Nobody believed as steadfastly in the A380 as he did. He had reckoned early on that the world’s biggest airliner, with room for up to 615 passengers in the Emirates version, was tailor-made for its business model of connecting the entire world via Dubai.
An Emirates Airlines Airbus A380 jumbo jet at the Dubai Air Show in November
Initially he even went as far as having cabin mock-ups constructed at the airline’s own expense to show Airbus that it was possible to install two showers in the front of the upper deck exactly where he wanted them. Only later did Airbus and its engine manufacturers reject the idea to develop an improved version with more efficient engines. It’s these four thirsty engines that made the A380 uneconomical for most operators long ago.
No celebrations planned
In the end, Clark wasn’t able to celebrate the final A380 delivery with the fanfare he was hoping for. Airbus rejected the idea of celebrating the end of a program, and then the pandemic situation in Germany rendered all efforts to honor the event useless.
“I said to Airbus’ CEO Guillaume Faury: ‘This thing has got real life and legs for us, this is not a funeral, just the last of these great airplanes,'” Clark told DW. “And we will fly the A380 as a very potent aircraft until the mid-2030s, so we’ve got 14-15 years before we retire them.”
But now the last A380, with the serial number 272, will be transferred unceremoniously on Thursday from the Airbus factory in Hamburg-Finkenwerder to Dubai. This will give Emirates a total of 118 service-ready A380s, about half of which are currently in deep storage waiting for better times.
It seems that the pandemic was the final straw for giant aircraft. Besides the end of the A380, the Boeing 747 program will also stop production in 2022 after over half a century.
Giant aircraft back in fashion?
In the fall of 2021, however, passenger numbers shot up so rapidly that some airlines suddenly remembered they still owned A380 fleets once deemed as write-offs. These aircraft were then able to solve short-term capacity problems.
It was like a new lease on life for giant aircraft. A good example is British Airways, which has been flying four of its dozen A380s since November. Singapore Airlines, having been part of the giant’s world premiere in 2007, also put some of its biggest airliners back in service on the London-Sydney route, among other destinations.
At Qatar Airways, the unexpected reversal of fortunes for the A380 was a huge U-turn. At one time they operated 10 of them. But in May, its CEO Akbar Al Baker publicly declared: “Looking back, it was the biggest mistake we did to purchase A380s.”
After that he continued to lambast the plane. “We grounded the A380 and never wanted to fly it again, because it is a very inefficient aircraft in fuel burn and emissions, and I don’t think there will be a market for it in the foreseeable future,” he criticized. “I know the passengers love it, it’s a very quiet and smart airplane, but the damage it does to the environment should be priority and not the comfort,” said Al Baker.
But all of a sudden there is a shortage of aircraft due to problems with the more modern Airbus A350s and “unfortunately we have no alternative but to fly the A380 again,” the CEO announced in late September. Since November, five of Qatar’s grey giants have been taking to the skies again.
Money down the drain?
In total, the A380 program cost an estimated €30 billion ($33.9 billion). Most of that money came from European taxpayers. But why was it a flop — at least in economic terms?
“We were blindsided by the engine manufacturers,” raged John Leahy, legendary Airbus aircraft salesman now in retirement, in an interview with the author.
The producers said they would come up with improved engine systems a decade later. But those engines were developed secretly and deployed much earlier in the smaller and more efficient 737 Dreamliner from rival Boeing.
But the main problem was the long delay in bringing the A380 to market. This delay showed painfully that the Airbus partners in Germany and France were not on the same page. At the time they literally worked on different, noncompatible IT systems.
The A380 is so huge it makes the terminal at Frankfurt Airport look small
SARS and a financial crisis
When the A380 finally went into service in 2008, the timing was extremely unfortunate. The SARS pandemic was followed by the global financial crisis and led to a collapse in demand for big aircraft. After that the market demanded smaller, more efficient aircraft, capable of flying nonstop long-haul routes that were economical even from secondary airports.
Thanks to the smaller Boeing 787 and Airbus A350, there were direct flights between cities like Düsseldorf and Tokyo or Munich and Bogota without changing planes or making refueling stops. Passengers were happy to avoid big-hub airports and Airbus lost out with its giants made for mass transportation.
Still industry experts and Airbus are sure of one thing. Despite it being an economic failure, the effort to build the A380 wasn’t entirely in vain. Most importantly, Airbus was forced to act as a corporate entity for the first time. The learning effect was paramount.
“All the fiasco around the A380 made the A350 definitely the best airplane program we’ve ever had,” asserted John Leahy, then the company’s most senior salesman.
The manufacturer was able to finally get rid of “the many little kingdoms” in all the partner countries. But “spending €25 or €30 billion on the A380 just to get that education seems like a very inefficient way to get that education,” said Leahy in hindsight.
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