The double-decked plane, which can carry 840 passengers, landed to applause at 2:22 p.m. (8:22 a.m. EDT) after a flight of nearly four hours. About 30,000 spectators watched the white plane with blue tail take off and touch down, 101 years after the Wright brothers achieved the first controlled, sustained flight. plane weighs 308 tons.‘‘The first flight of a brandnew aircraft is a real milestone,’’ co-pilot Claude Lelaie said. smaller, long-range jets like Boeing’s 787 ‘‘Dreamliner’’ show that Airbus was wrong to focus resources on a superjumbo jet at the expense of its own mid-size A350 — which is due to enter service in 2010, two years after its Boeing rival.
Before it landed, its front lights shining, the A380 did a slow flyover above the airport in Blagnac, southwest France, where it had taken off at 10:29 a.m. (4:29 a.m. EDT). The crew, dressed in orange suits, waved happily when they threw open the door and descended the steps.
‘‘A new page in aviation history has been written,’’ French President Jacques Chirac said in Paris. ‘‘It is a magnificent result of European industrial cooperation.’’ European governments put up about a third of the $13 billion spent in developing the A380 over 11 years, a huge gamble on a new jetliner size that Boeing passed on. The
Airbus believes airlines will need plenty of giant aircraft to fly passengers between everbusier hub airports. It designed the A380 to carry passengers about 5 percent farther than Boeing’s longest-range 747 jumbo jet, with a per-passenger cost as much as 20 percent lower. It has booked orders for 154 A380s from 15 carriers, including Air France, Lufthansa and Virgin.
But some analysts say signs of a boom in demand for
Airlines in mid-2006, about three months behind the previous schedule.
The A380 now is scheduled to enter service for Singapore
