The rise and fall of the world’s superjumbo A380

HONG KONG: Australia’s Qantas Airways said this week it would begin retiring its 10 Airbus A380 superjumbos from mid-2028, four years earlier than previously planned, as maintenance costs rise and newer, more efficient aircraft join its fleet.

Qantas International and Freight CEO Cam Wallace told analysts that keeping the aircraft flying was becoming increasingly costly and complex because the A380 has been out of production since 2021 and faces growing supply-chain constraints.

Here are ​key facts about the world’s largest passenger airliner:
> Airbus developed the four-engine A380 to challenge ‌the dominance of the Boeing 747 in the long-haul market.
> The ​full-length, double-deck aircraft is capable of carrying up to 853 passengers on two decks.
> It entered commercial service with Singapore Airlines in 2007.
> Airbus delivered a total of 251 A380s before ending production in 2021, after main customer Emirates dropped ​a large order.
> The A380’s high fuel and maintenance costs, along with the difficulty of consistently filling 500-plus seats, limited its appeal to ‌most airlines ​outside the Gulf.
> More efficient twin-engine widebodies such as the ​Boeing 787 and Airbus A350 further weakened its economics, while the Covid pandemic, which grounded ​almost the entire global A380 fleet, accelerated its decline.
> Out of the 251 aircraft delivered, 196 remain in service, according to Airbus July data.

Airlines that have retired or plan to retire A380:
> Air France: Retired its A380 fleet of 10 aircraft in 2020, bringing forward a phase-out originally planned for 2022 as the pandemic halted international ‌travel.
> China Southern Airlines: Retired its five A380s in late 2022 after maintaining A380 service throughout most of the pandemic.
> Malaysia Airlines: Retired its six A380s in 2023.
> Qantas: Will begin retiring its fleet of 10 A380 superjumbos from mid-2028, a move expected to generate about A$300 million (RM867 million) in net cashflow benefits between fiscal 2028 and fiscal 2031, mainly through savings from lower maintenance costs.
> During the ‌pandemic, Qantas grounded its A380 fleet for more than 500 days as international travel collapsed, with aircraft placed in long-term storage in California and Abu Dhabi.
> Other airlines that have downsized their A380 fleets in recent years ​include Thai Airways, Lufthansa, Korean Air, Singapore Airlines and Qatar Airways, Airbus data showed.

Current operators:
> Emirates is the largest ​A380 ​operator with a current fleet of 116 aircraft, representing nearly half of all A380 ever delivered.
> Singapore Airlines ​and British Airways each operate 12 A380s, making them the largest non-Emirates operators.
> Lufthansa, Qatar Airways and Etihad Airways each operate eight A380s.
> Korean Air, Asiana Airlines and Japan’s All Nippon Airways also operate the model.
> Emirates plans to keep flying the A380 into the 2040s, while other ​operators expect to phase out the aircraft from ​the early 2030s. – Reuters