This is rapidly becoming a very sad state of affairs and the overall losers will be the aviation industry in general unless this is ended amicably.
I could be wrong here but it seems to be another case of the US not being able to handle anyones elses successes very well. Remember their attitude to Concorde? We should not forget the huge subsidies furnished by the US govt in the developement of the ill fated Boeing 2707 SST programme. As has been said there is an impending Presidential election looming in the US and I guess that “getting tough with them damn Frenchies” will look good to some. IMO this is a risky strategy for the Americans to run as they are no strangers to subsidies in the aviation industry, both civil and military. Yes AI has had access to govt funds but strictly on a loan basis only and I understand with some tough repayment schedules and penalty clauses for late payment. I’m glad the EU is not taking this lightly. I think its high time for the US aircraft manufacturing empire to put up or shut up and get out there and build the aeroplanes that the airlines of today want to buy…time to stop re-hashing 60s technology and move on….Airbus will become unassailable if they don’t do it soon…Pay attention Boeing field-the writings on the wall guys. Please note that I’m neither anti American or a Boeing hater.

Thanks Dan, Its good to see in print what I suspected all along ref Boeing/Ryanair, this sounds conceited on my part but I’m not surprised.

Good Luck to the EU and Airbus on this one. It seems to be another good example of the U.S not being able to handle other peoples success very well.
We had the similar BS over Concorde I seem to remember.

Very nice….That Libyan livery looks good on most types operated by them.
Good to see them back at LHR too.

A direct comparison between these two types is flawed from the start. They are both designed to fulfil the two different markets currently claimed by Airbus and Boeing to exist in the airline industry. AI favours a continuation of the long haul hub system whereas Boeing opts for the evoulution of the point to point regime. IMO both will turn out to be correct depending on which part of the world a partucular carrier is operating and serving. There is likely to be a thriving market for both the A380 and 7E7 and our industry and the technology that supports it will be all the richer for these two aircraft. The great unknown at this stage however is oil prices.

Great pics as usual….Love the Tu154!……No bias on my part of course!

A horrible reminder of that incident a few years back when that FedEx employee on staff travel severely injured the crew of a company DC10 in much the same fashion.

Ryanair are not there to make it glamorous for the staff, they are in business to make money.

Regards,

kev35
Maybe so kev but IMO browbeating and exploiting ones staff is childsplay, managing them well, keeping them happy and productive, thats the art. I believe its called “Man management”