Saw AFR A380 on Monday Dec. 14

[Speedbird1]

I was surprised to hear that the AFR A380 had problems on Dec. 14. I watched AFR 6 being carefully towed to her gate at Terminal One. She was about 45 minutes delayed and arrived on Rwy 31L. It was interesting because she had to fit next to the Air China B744 which hadn't yet departed. All looked normal. What could have caused the return flight to CDG to be canceled?

[Cary]

http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forum ... n/4638791/ (http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/general_aviation/read.main/4638791/)

[Speedbird1]

Thanks for this connection. The guy who criticized why we post every time there is a problem with the new A380 is wrong. We are not picking on the aircraft but we're curious why all passengers were forced to disembark and stay overnight. I also notice that Air France uses a B777 once a week for the flight rather than using the A380 daily. This is a good idea so the engineers at CDG can work out the kinks on this new airliner.

[Matt Molnar]

http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/general_aviation/read.main/4638791/

Actually posted a story about this the other night, but forgot to post it here. D'oh.

:arrow: Air France A380 Breaks Down in New York, Stranding 530 Passengers (http://nycaviation.com/2009/12/15/air-france-a380-breaks-down-in-new-york-stranding-580-passengers/)

Anyway, seems Miss 380 made it back to Paris only to break down again, but is expected to be fixed by tomorrow. According to an Air France press release, today's AF006, which had about 480 reservations, is being subbed by a 777, meaning bout 180 pax have to be reaccommodated. Probably a similar situation for tonight's Paris-bound AF007.


Un Boeing 777 d'Air France a remplacé l'A380 de la compagnie qui devait assurer le vol AF 006 du 17 décembre, en raison d'une problème technique.

Dans la soirée, le Boeing 777 acheminera à destination 303 des 481 passagers prévus. Les autres passagers ont été pris en charge et seront acheminés demain sur les différents vols de la compagnie.

L'A380 assurera normalement le vol AF 006 du 18 décembre 2009.

Toutes les compagnies aériennes connaissent des irrégularités d'exploitation quand elles introduisent dans leur flotte un nouveau type d'avion. La régularité redevient normale après l'incontournable temps d'adaptation.

[LGA777]

To add to Gothams post from what I understand todays A-380 arrival from CDG was delayed till 0100 when AF realized it could not be repaired today and a 773 is being subbed. Also the original problem at JFK that caused the ferry flight back to CDG was repaired, this is an unrealted different mtx problem. Guess it sucks to be an AF JFK customer service agent this week. Good luck to them and maybe they will have better luck tommorow.

Regards

LGA777

[Iberia A340-600]

Luckily for the passengers involved in this situation they are dealing with Air France, whom in my experience, is extremely professional and accommodating, especially when the airline is at fault for a canceled or missed connection. It is unfortunate that the A380 has had two incidents in the short time it has been in operations with the airline but with only one aircraft running almost daily rotations, snafus are to be expected. On the 15th Air France ran an extra flight with the A340-300 to accommodate passengers.

[hiss srq]

I know everyone wants to say "lets be fair it is a new airplane" about the 380 but looking through various reputable aviation incident reporting systems each 380 in service right now sans EK's which have somehow been ironed out or swept under a rug someplace has experinced about one major mechanical event every three days or so. AirFrance and Singapore are getting racked with problems. To me this spells Airbus again shoving a unfinished product out the door in plain English. Similar to the A320 before all the modifications were made to the model. My personal opinion but I baseit on fact.

[NLovis]

Yea Airbus planes break down frequently. My father used to work on them and hes told me there not too good. If you are flying no an airbus you can be sure tis flying with some type of problem. Which can relate to one of my flights at work last week. There are usually 2 Iberia A340 flights into JFK. In tues its only the second late flight since that flight has a code share with AA. Anyway baggage room up at the plane cause they loaded a wrong bag which causes a delay. Expecting about 5min ot. no big deal. We push out the plane to the taxiway and when the pilots try starting #4 engine the APU died out and the plane is now on the taxiway without any power. Note its about 9:40 now and today its one of Iberia's newer A340-600's. Few minutes later they get the APU running again and try again and after a pop the APU shuts down again. At this point i'm like why didnt they tell us there was a problem with the plane we would have had the airstart ready. So we tow it back to gate 6 and hook up a GPU ans get the airstart which is cold. Its a cold night too so were all standing around cold waiting to get the plane out so we can go home. We airstart the plane but usual Ibera pilots they take there time leaving so after the engines are started its about 5-10 minutes later before the pilots tell us to pushback. Long story short there is always a problem. Emirates actually grounded its A380 cause it was breaking down so often. The A380 actually looks better built but so far from what i'm hearing its the same as the others.

[PhilDernerJr]

Though I certainly have a Boeing bias, I don't think that such a blanket against all Airbus aircraft is fair or accurate. More airplanes break down every single day than people realize, and Airbus 320 family, A330s, A340s and more are strong workhorses for many airlines around the world. Though I myself would rather be on a 777 or something, a majority of my own personal flight have been on Airbus with nary a problem.

[Speedbird1]

The A388 I saw back on Monday at JFK has not returned since to JFK. All week, it has been replaced by a B773. If the A388 is so unreliable, why is it being flown in the first place? Imagine purchasing a ticket to fly on the new Air France A388 and being sent on a B773 instead. The passengers can't get a refund since they're not reserving a certain aircraft but are reserving on a certain flight. Air France should have delayed A388 service until they had at least 1 back-up aircraft.

[LGA777]

At US LGA almost our entire Mainline schedule has been A-320 Family aircraft for several years, and their overall reliabulity is very good. Much better than when our flights where a mix of Boeing, McDonald-Douglas, and Fokker.

My 2 cents

LGA777

[NLovis]

The A388 I saw back on Monday at JFK has not returned since to JFK. All week, it has been replaced by a B773. If the A388 is so unreliable, why is it being flown in the first place? Imagine purchasing a ticket to fly on the new Air France A388 and being sent on a B773 instead. The passengers can't get a refund since they're not reserving a certain aircraft but are reserving on a certain flight. Air France should have delayed A388 service until they had at least 1 back-up aircraft.
I've noticed that as well. its been gone all week with a mix of aircraft taking its place from a 777 and A330. The main reason airlines are buying from airbus is because there plaines are cheaper. As they say you get what you pay for. Sure airbus makes a cheaper plane but thats because they dont build them as well as Boeing or Mc Donnald Douglas did. What the airlines are failing to see is that they are actually spending more on the planes because of the frequency of breakdowns on airbus aircraft not to mention the less made. Pay more get the better aircraft and make more money.