An aircraft for all seasons

The A380 flying currently at ILA will leave Berlin on Thursday to fly to London Heathrow where it will land and perform ground servicing tests at the airport. This will be the first appearance of the A380 in London. The aircraft will then return to Berlin for the remaining days of the show.

This A380, test aircraft MSN4, is the second aircraft to fly. Equipped with flight test equipment but without a cabin, it has not only participated in many air shows where it demonstrates its elegance and manoeuvrability, but it has also performed all the tests in extreme environment, which are part of the certification programme.

It was this aircraft, which wowed the crowds during the Asian-Australian tour in November 2005. The same month, decked in Emirates’ livery, it took part in the daily flight displays at the Dubai air show.

In January 2006, it flew to Medellin, Colombia for high altitude tests, stopping in Guadeloupe for some hot weather tests on its way back to Toulouse.

Then going from one extreme to another, the aircraft took off in February for “cold soaks trials” in Iqaluit, Canada where it spent five days in conditions of up to minus 30 degrees Celsius. This proved successfully the full functionality of the systems under extreme weather conditions.

After a quick stop in Toulouse to be decorated in Singapore Airlines’ livery, the same aircraft flew to Singapore and its hot and humid atmosphere, where it not only appeared daily in the air show but also performed a second series of airport ground equipment trials.

The aircraft will be seen tomorrow flying over London after a fly over the two UK Airbus’ sites of Filton and Broughton. For this flight, the crew comprises test pilots Ed Strongman and Jacques Rosay plus Wolfgang Absmeier who will fly it back to Berlin, test flight engineer Pascal Verneau, and flight test engineers Didier Ronceray and Hermann Schmoekel.

This summer, MSN4 will face very hot weather trials and demonstrate its adaptability to all sorts of climates, all sorts of airports and all sorts of conditions.