pune | a380 review

I think this would be a fitting wrap-up to my India series, and to cap everything off, I had the opportunity to check out the new (well relatively new) Airbus A380. Now, I’m not as much of an airliner nut as LynnKai, but I do like planes and ships, and I will admit getting excited over a chance to fly on an a380 from Frankfurt to SFO (LH454). In case you aren’t familiar, this Airbus is the world’s largest passenger airliner, and can seat over 500 people in a typical 3-class arrangement, or up to 853 people in an all economy configuration. Basically, this plane is a beast.

three bridges to load passengers

another a380 taking off

My first impressions of the plane were that it was pretty cool. Everything was new (I don’t really know what a new plane smell would be, but I’m sure it had it) and it seemed like the equipment was well cared for. I took to exploring the plane a bit, as I heard there were things on this plane that are pretty unique. Sadly, I was unable to explore the other deck, as the stairs were blocked off (supposedly to prevent passengers from drinking too much and falling down the stairs during flight – I don’t buy it).

the other a380

takeoff!!

bird's eye view

I was quickly able to find a few things that piqued my interest. The first was the exterior cameras. There are three cameras on the outside of the plane that showed what was going on. It was pretty cool being able to watch things like takeoffs, landings, and the bird-eye view was cool for watching the ground. Of course, in midflight all three camera showed the same thing: clouds.

The second thing that was pretty neat was the fact that one of the bathrooms had a freaking window! I know, this may not be interesting to most people I meet, but it was pretty cool. I was able to look down at clouds as I used the facilities. It was quite pleasant. It also made the bathroom feel a lot less claustrophobic as just a little bit of natural lighting helped make it feel roomier. Of course, it was still an airplane bathroom, so you never really wanna stay in there too long.

While the plane was pretty cool, there were some really perplexing things about the plane (or more specifically, what Lufthansa did). So, Lufthansa got the new planes in 2010, and overhauled their terminals in Frankfurt (as well as other airports) to accommodate the sheer size of the new planes. The weird thing was, even though they designed new gates to accommodate the height of the 2nd deck, they built the a380 gates too high. Even for the 2nd deck, you end up going down a flight of escalators to get there. There aren’t any plans to build any planes even bigger than this, so what exactly was the point of that?

The next odd and fairly disappointing thing was the fact that Lufthansa went through the trouble of procuring a fleet of new a380’s, but they then put their old design seats in them, even though they had a new design in production. Now, only 3 years in, they’re going through the hassle of retrofitting the planes with the new seats. I don’t understand why they don’t just put the new seats in there in the first place.

I was kind of hoping to be able to walk around the plane more and be able to check out the other floor, the flight attendants somehow frown upon you walking about the plane. Also, apparently there’s an FAA regulation saying you can’t congregate anywhere (only applies to US-bound or flights out of the US), which makes sense from a safety point of view, but I wonder how that would work for Emirates or Korean Air A380’s that have a bar at the back of the plane?

Overall, the A380 was a pretty fun experience. Again, it would’ve been fun to be able to walk about the plane a bit more, but it’s ok…I’m sure the other floor looks pretty much the same. Next on my airliner bucket-list is the boeing 787, which recently had battery issues (but hey…the risk adds to the excitement right?), and the boeing 747-8, which was apparently built to compete with the A380. I also hear British Airways is supposed to have a great A380 when it is available in October…mm maybe next year when I get more vacation days.