Fact is, Airbus are skirting round the rules here. I hope someone puts a stop to this.

Agreed! Maximum capacity should be equal to the number you can evacuate under the rules!

[QUOTE=GZYL] The A380 should be able to manage this, with 80 people from each of the 7 exits.

QUOTE]

Half of the exits will permit evactuation through 8 exits as the A380 has 16 in total.

I agree completely, if Boeing want to stick one in the eye of Airbus then surely they know what to do 😉

Doesn’t look too good, but looking at the big picture, most accidents will be made up of the aircraft hitting the ground at some force bringing death. The only real reason to vacate an aircraft quickly (on the ground) will normaly not be too serious, so the folk will have a chance to escape unhurt.

On a side note, does a variant have to be re-tested? i.e. the 777 – 300, did that have to go through a separate test from the 777 – 200?

dme

If I can refer you to a couple of accidents in which there was no impact but people were killed…Manchester, British Airtours 737, 1985, the aircraft hadn’t even taken off when the incident occured and the aircraft left the runway before coming to a halt. Saudi L1011, 1980, Riyadh. The aircraft landed safely with a cargo hold fire, for some reason the evacuation was never started, all on board died of smoke inhilation, but no other injuries.

These are just two good examples, there are plenty more, evacuation ability is highly important!

On the other note, my understanding of the aircraft certification system is that in the case of the 777-300ER and 200LR the aircraft will not undergo such trials again, only if the manufacturer wanted to increase the maximum permitted passenger capacity would they need to do them again.

I would rather they got it right, before they took the mamoth into the air 😛

I’m sure the good people of Toulouse agree whole heartedly with this statement 🙂

Lets face it, there aren’t that many aircraft which take off on time for their first flights….

To be honest, he’s not gonna put his hands up and admit there are any issues is he?
No one in their right mind would.

The fact that the first flight may be delayed untill April is indicative of some sort of issue. But that could be anything, from logisitics problems to the Airport being too busy or heck, bad weather forecasts.

I’m still not convinced that it is among the latter reasons. They admitted it was overweigh for example, and that the weight could be dealt with by increasing the MTOW, but I haven’t seen a conclusion to that issue completely, so how many other issues may be outstanding that we don’t know the outcome of??