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Etihad Airways To Reintroduce Airbus A380 After Years of Storage

Etihad’s A380 lands at London Heathrow (Photo: AirlineGeeks | William Derrickson)

There’s been much speculation about the return of the A380, but recently Etihad Airways announced that the airline will bring back four of the super-jumbos. The first Airbus A380 will be reintroduced from summer 2023.

Within days of the news of the last Boeing 747 produced in Everett, on the outskirts of Seattle, on behalf of Atlas Air, it was thought that the era of the super-jumbo was definitely over. Airbus had also produced the last Airbus A380 for Emirates, the world’s largest A380 user, marking the end of an era for an aircraft that was once considered the future of aviation because of the ever-increasing demand for passenger transport.

However, because of the pandemic, the huge drop in travelers due to restrictions, the tourism-related civil aviation crisis, and new targets to combat environmental pollution, almost all of the airlines (that survived the impact of the crisis) set aside the super-jumbos for “smaller” and more efficient, next-generation aircraft.

Despite these two very bad years, however, there is a great upswing in tourism, and just a few days ago Etihad Airways, the national airline of the United Arab Emirates, announced that it would reintroduce the Airbus A380 into its fleet after a surge in requests from its customers.

Etihad Airways had removed the Airbus A380 from its fleet in 2021 and even Etihad Group CEO Tony Douglas was certain that it would not return to the fleet, even deleting it from the airline’s website.

However, thanks to an incredible surge in demand that has made them financially viable again, four Airbus A380s will operate on the route between Abu Dhabi and London’s Heathrow Airport, and the first will be reintroduced starting in the summer of 2023. The increase in demand for air travel is not only on the single route but has been recorded by the airline across its entire network. Etihad, however, plans to bring four of its A380s back into the fleet in the summer of 2023, with the possibility also to increase frequencies on existing routes and to launch new destinations. The return of the Airbus A380s will also be supported by the addition of five Airbus A320s to the fleet.

Etihad is currently preparing the aircraft to fly again, and part of this preparation includes recruiting and training A380 teams, including pilots, cabin crew, and technical ground staff.

Antonoaldo Neves, Chief Executive Officer of Etihad Airways, commented that with the Airbus A380, its award-winning cabins will be reintroduced, such as the famous First Class cabin “The Residence,” for the first time, offered as an option for guests to further enhance their experience in First.

Etihad’s Airbus A380s feature The Residence and three cabin classes on the double-decker aircraft, including 9 First Apartments, 70 Business Studios and 405 Economy Smart Seats.

Vincenzo Claudio Piscopo
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  • Vincenzo Claudio Piscopo

    Vincenzo graduated in 2019 in Mechanical Engineering with an aeronautical curriculum, focusing his thesis on Human Factors in aircraft maintenance. In 2022 he pursued his master's degree in Aerospace Engineering at the University of Palermo, Italy. He combines his journalistic activities with his work as a Reliability Engineer at Zetalab.

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