Yesterday, owing to the unusual winds what blew away* the fog, I saw jumbo jets above S.F. in places where I normally don’t, but I couldn’t really hear them. (I guess jets have gotten a lot quieter these days.)
Like this low-flying United Air 747-400 near the Ferry Building – you could hardly hear it:
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*I suppose – cf. yesterday’s Blue Sky Red Bridge from Burrito Justice
Well, here’s the latest from Business Report – The Chronicle with Bloomberg:
Giant A380 jetliner proves SFO planners were right
Uh, so I’m not saying that the powers that be shouldn’t have gotten ready for the long-delayed Airbus A380 jumbo jet, but this wasn’t all that much of a gutsy call, right? It’s like, should we prepare to accommodate the jets that are being planned for five-ten years from now?
O.K., so why not prepare? Sure. But I don’t know how much credit should go to the people of SFO for doing what they’re paid to do.
See? Some have three jetway thingees, some have two:
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In other news, the new A380 uses more fuel than any other airliner you could think of. So this is incorrect:
“It’s a much less fuel-consuming aircraft. It’s a much more efficient aircraft; it costs 30 percent less to operate than other wide bodies.”
And considering all the hype, the hype like this:
“The A380′s modernity, comfort and stylishness should help drive business between the Bay Area and overseas markets, said R. Sean Randolph, president and CEO of the Bay Area Council Economic Institute. Randolph said he thinks this is especially true of the burgeoning business relationship with India, which generates high transpacific traffic.”
…the A380 appears to be kind of a big nothingburger. You want to fly from India, you can do it on a Boeing 777 or an old 747 or, soon enough, the long-delayed new 747-8i. And in fact, if anything, the trend of rising fuel prices is making some airlines rethink the desirability of non-stop hops from faraway lands. And “stylishness?” You know, I’d just love to make business with you there, Reddy, but that triple-seven they want me to fly over on, well, it just doesn’t do it for me, it’s not stylish at all, you know? I’ll wait until Airbus makes a fat piggy plane with wings that are too big (because they were designed for future stretched versions like the A380-900, or, Gaia help us, the mythical A380-1000. But, seeing as how the freighter version of the miraculous, wonderful, oh-my-God-this-changes-everything A380 got cancelled, it might be a good long time before the world sees a stretched A380…)
And speaking of the new 747, Lufthansa is also buying those as well, so maybe you’ll be on a Boeing the next time you fly to Frankfurt. IRL, Lufthansa calculates about a 3% delta in fuel economy per passenger betwixt the newish A380 and the impending Boeing 747-8i.
Anyway, the giant A380 jetliner does not necessarily prove SFO planners right, just saying.
Now, about those substandard runways…
Here it is, the latest VLA (Very Large Aircraft) to hit the skies. Get all the deets right here and be sure to check out the Flight Tracker – they flew over Port Angeles (and not too far from Forks, WA and La Push Beach (for you Twilight fans)).
The other VLA up there there is the Airbus A380 Superjumbo, which burns more fuel but has more seats. The test will be when you fill up both with maximum passengers and then fly a certain distance and then figure the fuel burn per passenger.
The A380 is a new plane but it’s kind of stubby and its engines are older than those on the freshened 747. Probably the A380 will win the mpg battle, but only by a few percentage points. And both manufacturers (but especially Airbus) might end up losing money on these programs. Oh well.
First flight:
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Anyway, that’s current battle above your heads….
Now it’s sort remarkable how no passenger has died the past decade in an Airbus or Boeing jetliner that either took off or landed in the United States. Of course there was the 9/11 and shortly after that at the end of 2001 there was American Airlines Flight 587, but since then, nothing. That’s a pretty good record, non?
But you people, you don’t listen when they tell you to turn off your portable electronic devices during critical phases of flight. And then stuff like this happens.
Just saying, bro-ham.
Ah the daily Lufthansa flight from Frankfort, Germany. This happens to be an aging Boeing 747-400, but in a few months it will get replaced by a superjumbo A380.* Can you see someone iPodding or texting up there? I can:
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*No, contrary to what the Mayor’s Office tells you, the A380 doesn’t use less fuel than legacy aircraft. And the version that’ll soon be coming to SFO each and every day has wings that are too big for its body, and it’s overweight, and blah blah blah. But oh well.
There wasn’t all that much coverage of the incident back in the day, so the time that a United Airlines Boeing 747-400 out of SFO with 300 people aboard came super close to crashing into 1,576-foot-high San Bruno Mountain is worth remembering.
Did the pilot at the controls really forget how to steer the plane after one of the engines failed and lots of vibration began? Pretty much. But everybody treated this near miss as if it were an actual accident and procedures for pilot training are now better because of it.
The proper way to clear San Bruno:
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Some of the locals of San Mateo and San Francisco living around the mountain won’t ever forget hearing and feeling that particular flight.
That’s something to think about when you’re out and about near the mountain, huh?
Does this huge, somewhat ungainly superjumbo jet seen above SFO today look somewhat familiar? It should, as we’ve seen its kind before. But Qantas is proud that it has the first scheduled Airbus A380 flight into San Francisco. These paying passengers came all the way from Cindy, Australia.
Check out the photos of our welcome at the International Terminal. (The kangaroo QANTAS had in Sydney yesterday at the start of the flight was a bit more lively than the specimen we had this morning at SFO, it appears. And for some reason, the Emirates A380 seems to be more luxurious. And there was no sign of Ralph Fiennes. But that’s not the problem.)
The problem is that this is all a tease and the big new metal bird is going to spend its time in sunny Los Angeles. Why? Read on.
The A380-800 looks stubby because it is. Its wings is too big for its body! But that will pay off once stretched models start coming out in a few years. Then this series of aircraft will look better proportioned, more like the graceful stretched Boeing 747. Click to expand:
Now back a half-year ago, the Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services got all huffy at LAX and threatened that it would “move its flagship Airbus A380 services to San Francisco” unless Los Angeles upgraded its facilities.
Of course we’ve got mad upgrades up here in the 415. But not as many Australians want to come to the Bay Area compared with SoCal, and Oneworld connections with American Airlines are easier in LAX than in the Bay Area, and yada yada yada. So Qantas and El Lay patched things up and S.F. got left at the altar.
We’ll have to make do with regular old 747 service to Oz for a while longer anyway. But our cargo cult terminal upgrades for the new superjumbos should be worth the effort down the road, especially when the economy recovers.
And these days you can fly down under for cheap, so check the details after the jump.
G’day mates.
Here it is, the latest runway model from Emirates Airlines - the Airbus A380-800, complete with lounges and showers. It’s new, it’s you!
If you’ve never heard of Emirates, you’re not alone. But they’re growing like crazy and they’ll soon become a choice for international travel from the Bay Area. And you’ll be flying in style, in an old-school way. There was no “cattle-car” environment aboard yesterday when this fully-equipped aircraft arrived at SFO.
Watch the video, you’ll see. And check out Wired’s report also. O.K., let’s go.
The largest aircraft ever to come to SFO immediately gets hazed with water canon. Its wings, built larger than necessary in anticipation of the stretched A380-900 model, have an organic gull-wing look. Click to enlarge:
The new Airbus taxis at SFO, San Mateo-Hayward Bridge in the background. 22 huge Goodrich tires help ease the load on runways.
Look at this – three ways to get on the plane. It’s taking a while for Los Angeles to get their A380 program going. So much so, that Qantas had to lay down the law to LAX. Could Qantas come here to the bay area instead?
“SFO is the first U.S. airport with the built-in capacity to conveniently handle these kinds of passenger planes,” Mayor Gavin Newsom said in a prepared statement. “We are ready for the future of international air travel – which is of great benefit to Bay Area businesses and residents as well as visitors.”
A380 Chief Pilot, Captain Abbas Shaban, pulls up to the newly-embiggened Gate 9 in the International Wing. SFO’s Jim Chiu says that San Francisco is already able to handle three A380 superjumbos at once
The aforementioned Captain Abbas Shaban, having just arrived from New York
A news conference question about air service to Africa from the award-winning BeyondChron.com.
A random shot from the news conference. Do you like these uniforms? Is this a pillbox hat?
All right, all aboard the new plane - let’s go for a ride, after the jump
