Airbus Provides More Options for A380

Airbus, the French manufacturer of civil aircrafts, has recently announced that the company has been taking into consideration the redesign of their A380 wide body, double deck aircraft. In its current state, the A380 aircraft is the largest passenger airplane in the world, as it is capable of carrying up to 544 passengers in a four-class configuration. In the single class configuration, the A380 aircraft is capable of carrying up to 853 passengers. In order to accommodate the world’s largest passenger airliner, the airports at which this superjumbo aircraft operates have been upgraded with facilities to better serve this large aircraft.

The Airbus A380 aircraft features a stunning stairway which has been designed to resemble the staircases found in an ocean cruise ship. The two levels of this double decker aircraft are connected by a grand stairway in order to make the airplane more attractive to its customers and operators as well as to increase the passenger capacity.

However, the plane manufacturer noticed, that passengers do not feel the need to walk between the main deck and the upper level during the journeys and the stairway could be redesigned to accommodate as many as 60 passengers without the reduction of the width of seats or the aisle,” suggested Aero Time.

The passengers would be seated in a 3-5-3 setting, instead of the current 3-4-3 setting. In addition, the crew rest area could be redesigned to create more room.

At its current rate, the profit margin of the Airbus A380 aircraft remains very low. The aircraft manufacturer has barely broken even with this aircraft, prompting the company to search for new options in order to make the aircraft more attractive to potential carriers. Last year in 2016, the aircraft manufacturer delivered 27 A380 aircrafts as the company was assembling slightly more than 2 aircrafts per month. As of April of 2016, Airbus had received a total of 319 orders for their A380 aircraft. Starting in 2017, Airbus expects the assembly rate to decrease to 1.7 aircrafts per month.