Is 2005 the Year of the Airbus A380?

Is 2005 the Year of the Airbus A380?

As we come to the end of another year the world of aviation waits with expectancy for Tuesday 18 January 2005, the official roll out day for the Airbus A380 at Toulouse. It is bound to be a great event with all the hierarchy around in great numbers and everyone patting each other on the back. The real work would have been done not by the civil servants and front men celebrating in style but by engineers, tool makers and designers from across Europe and throughout the industrial world. The emergence of the A380 is to the credit of the whole aviation industry. One word of caution however. Don't believe Airbus when they say that only 4% of the cost is assembly. The fact that Airbus is centered in Toulouse has turned a once sleepy French provincial city into a real growth town. The center of European aviation is now in south west France.

Amongst all the euphoria last week EADS estimated the cost overrun on the A380 at E1.45bn / US$1.92bn, including work to improve its efficiency and weight. Airbus CEO Noel Forgeard has publicly put the figure at E1bn / US$1.32bn over budget.

Over the last two weeks both Airbus and Boeing have been to London making presentations on their 20 year forecasts. In fact when you actually unravel the costly (but very well produced) discourses Airbus predict a requirement for 17,328 new aircraft in the plus one hundred seat range over the next two decades and Boeing 20,000. This represents an average of 830 units per year (using the Airbus figures) as against approximately 315 aircraft from Airbus and around 280 from Boeing in 2004, produced in factories at Hamburg and Toulouse, and two in Seattle.

Either there is going to be a substantial rise in production at the exiting sites or new assembly lines will have to open, perhaps in China. The Russians might also get their act together and are capable of building fine aircraft. What emerges from the federation of former communist countries we wait to see.

By mid-January the A380 order book may have risen from the present, and not insubstantial, 129. Compare that with when Boeing unveiled the first 747, 178 orders including 40 for Pan Am, the same again for BOAC (soon to become BA) and substantial commitments from JAL, Lufthansa and United Airlines amongst others. To date 1,351 Boeing 747s have been delivered with at least 34 to follow. Will the same kind of numbers be produced for the 21st century 'Jumbo'? The outlook has changed and the leap from the 180 passenger 707 to a 400 seat 747 is not so great this time around. The world's largest airline market, in terms of passengers, North America, has not ordered a single A380. By 2008 five, maybe six airlines are expected to be operating out of Heathrow, all of them flying east. Airbus predict a market of 1,250 very large aircraft over the next 20 years whilst Boeing says it will be 790. How does that compare with 1,385 747s ordered over 35 years and 122 in the boom year of 1990? At least IATA more or less agrees with the growth, figures just released indicating an expansion in the short term of 6% annually for international passengers and 6% for cargo tonnage 2005-2008. Toulouse say 5.3% overall. What will be the public reaction to flying with 550 others? The airports say they can handle the numbers, but they would, wouldn't they!

One big difference between Boeing and Airbus is that the US manufacturer never had any competition at the top end of the market. Now Seattle is talking about an Advanced 747 with 450 seats using 7E7 engine technology and featuring a redesigned wing. This, so Seattle claims, would cut trip costs, offer an 8,000 nm range, be more economical and quieter with significantly fewer emissions. Clearly a launch customer is required but there are not too many of those around.

A clear indication of the way that the world's airports are moving with the A380 is the unveiling by Frankfurt Airport of a full scale cabin section model of the aircraft's interior. Positioned in Terminal 1 in Departures Hall A near Entrance 2 transiting passengers can view the A380 between 0900 and 1800. Lufthansa's first A380 is due to come into service in the Autumn of 2007. Heathrow has designed T5 around the A380 and is also organizing T3 apron space and gates to accommodate the new aircraft. Whilst no A380 will be flying west LHR looks like becoming, at least in the beginning, the home of the new Airbus with residents Emirates, Etihad, Korean, Malaysian, Qantas, Qatar and Thai all customers. However 2007 is still to come. 2005 will herald a new age for air transport. Something to look forward to.