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Countdown to the superjumbo

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(CNN) -- Over the coming months, Business Traveller will keep you up to date with the plane's progress as the first superjumbos come off the production line.

The A380 is designed to carry an average of 555 passengers over distances up to 8,000 nm/ 15,000 km. To-date, 166 A380s have been ordered. Plans for the A380 to be delivered to first operator Singapore Airlines have been postponed to October 2007.

December

The A380 has been busy this month, completing its latest route-proving mission around the world. Route proving is a key element of the certification process, demonstrating that the superjumbo can work smoothly with airport infrastructure, from taxiing and docking, to cleaning and refueling.

Route proving also gives the A380 the opportunity to meet another of its certification requirements -- 150 flight hours of continuous airline style flight operations. Five development A380s have now flown. Four are involved in the flight test program, while the fifth is undergoing cabin fit-out in Hamburg.

November

The Airbus A380 has been undergoing a final series of test flights this month designed to lead to the superjumbo's air-worthiness certification by the end of the year.

It has flown around the world, taking off from Toulouse and stopping off in Singapore, China, South Korea and Japan before returning to France.

Airbus has received orders for 166 superjumbo jets, including five from Korean Air Co. -- South Korea's largest passenger carrier and the world's biggest cargo airline.

However it suffered a blow earlier in the month when FedEx cancelled its order for 10 A380-800F freighter aircraft and switched to rival U.S. planemaker Boeing. Thai Airways have not ruled out the possibility of canceling its order for six aircraft as delivery delays force it to alter its long-term business plan, an executive for the airline said on Friday.

October

Not the best of months for Airbus. It announced on October 24 that it needs to sell 420 of the superjumbos in order for the program to begin to make money. It's previous estimate of 270 proving woefully inadequate.

This comes after the extent of the A380 delivery delays were revealed earlier this month, leaving airlines reeling. Singapore Airlines will not receive the first of its 10 planes until next October, while Emirates, the airline with the largest order of 43 planes, will not take delivery until August 2008.

Compensation, which could be hundreds of millions of U.S. dollars, will have to be paid to the 15 airlines with A380s order, while many airlines have said they will be reviewing thier orders.

Bad news for the A380 this month spread to rest of Airbus. First it announced a cost-cutting program that will lead to company-wide job losses, then its CEO Christian Streiff resigned on October 9 after only three months in the job.

His position became untenable as he tried to streamline the company's cumbersome management structure arousing the wrath of the German government. He has been replaced by Louis Gallois, who becomes the company's fourth CEO in 16 months.

September

It has been a turbulent month for the troubled A380 project.

Airbus' parent company, EADS, announced that there would be further delays to the delivery of the airliner.

"The current status is that we have not finalized the schedule of deliveries nor the financial impact of any delays. All appropriate resources are focused on bringing the ongoing assessment to maturity," it said in a statement on September 22.

The admission that there will be further delays comes after the replacement of Charles Champion as head of the superjumbo project earlier this month - the third official to lose his post after previous setbacks. Airbus blamed the previous set of delays on wiring installation problems.

Champion has been replaced by Mario Heinen, a 50-year-old executive from Luxembourg, who had been in charge of the single-aisle range of A320-family jets.

Better news was the successful test flights earlier this month from Toulouse carrying 474 Airbus staff. Each had secured their places on the historic flight through a company lottery.

During the seven-hour flights over France, Spain, Britain and Germany, 30 Airbus cabin experts and manufactures were aboard to test on-board features, with the galleys, seating, air-conditioning and in-flight entertainment all put through their paces.

Another obstacle to the project is the ruling from the International Civil Aviation Organization in November on the A380's "wake vortices" -- the air turbulence behind the aircraft that can be dangerous to other airliners flying close behind it.

A temporary maximum exclusion zone has been imposed as a precaution, which if made permanent would delay planes behind the super-jumbo and significantly affect its efficiency.

August

Australia's Qantas Airways is to receive more than A$100 million (U.S.$77 million) in damages from Airbus for delays in deliveries of its 12 firm-ordered A380-800s. It has meanwhile confirmed orders for four more Airbus A330 twinjets, two of which will be leased.

Qantas, which has been one of the world's most profitable airlines in recent years, said on August 16 its net earnings for the year to June 30, 2006 plunged 30.4 percent to A$480 million ($370 million), compared with A$688.5 million a year earlier. Revenue rose 8.6 percent to a record $10.2 billion.

The airline will take delivery of its first Airbus A380 super-jumbo in late 2007 and will also introduce the Boeing 787 Dreamliner in 2008. Qantas said its pre-tax profit of A$671 million recognized A$104 million in liquidated damages from Airbus due to the delayed delivery of the A380.

July

News about the A380 took a backseat to its smaller counterpart, the A350, during the week of the Farnborough Airshow in England, which kicked off on July 17.

Airbus announced that the A350 would get a revamp in a bid to boost orders of the mid-size plane, which is less popular than its Boeing counterpart, the 787-Dreamliner.

The A380 was not altogether absent from Farnborough, though. The aircraft took part in the daily flying displays at one of the biggest events on the aviation calendar.

New Airbus CEO Christian Streiff, in the job for two weeks, acknowledged at a press conference on the first day at Farnborough that the company was in crisis following the management fallout over wiring complications with the A380 that has led to production delays of the superjumbo.

"Airbus is in the middle of a severe crisis in its relations with its customers," Streiff told reporters, adding that the company had faith in the A380 superjumbo.

Noel Forgeard, who was co-chief executive of Airbus's parent company EADS, resigned on July 2, two weeks after Airbus had announced that wiring problems with the A380 would lead to delays to deliveries of the aircraft.

The incident highlighted communication problems between the directors of Airbus and EADS and called into question the competence of Forgeard and Airbus chief executive Gustav Humbert, who also resigned.

Pressure on Forgeard grew when it was revealed he had sold EADS stock options in March, before the production problems were made public, netting himself a profit of almost 2.5 million euros ($3.2 million). Forgeard maintains he was unaware of production problems when he sold the shares.

His resignation comes as part of a management shake-up aimed at restoring investor and customer confidence after Airbus disclosed the A380 production delays.

Meanwhile, Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic Airways said on July 16 his company was in talks with Airbus about changing the mix and number of its plane orders to fill a possible gap caused by delays in deliveries of the A380.

On July 21, Singapore Airlines gave Airbus a significant boost by ordering 20 of the new A350 XWB planes, becoming the first airline to commit to the revamped aircraft.

The Asian carrier said it also plans to exercise an option to pick up nine more of A380s, despite anticipated delays to the delivery of the superjumbo -- pushing Airbus' total orders or commitments at the Farnborough International Airshow beyond those reached by U.S. arch rival Boeing .

On July 25, Airbus acknowledged it had reinforced the rear fuselage of the A380 after problems were detected, but insisted that the issue did not cause any further delays in the plane's production timetable. This came after a report in German weekly Der Spiegel describing the fuselage troubles.

June 2006

Four million of these 3 euro French postage stamps showing the A380 were released on 27 June.

Airbus announces fresh delays to deliveries of the A380 on June 13.

"We have had an industrial delay. It will shift the program to the right by six to seven months," John Leahy, Airbus chief commercial officer, said.

Leahy said the company was still on track to have the plane certified and to deliver its first aircraft to Singapore Airlines by end-2006, but deliveries in 2007 would be cut to nine aircraft from an original target of 20 to 25.

Airbus said there would also be shortfalls of between five and nine planes in 2008 and of around five in 2009. It declined to identify which airlines may be affected.

Airbus faces fines for late delivery of aircraft under an earlier setback, which was also partly blamed on problems with producing the wiring in the plane's fuselage.

Airlines around the world reacted angrily to the news, demanding compensation, reconsidering orders -- and in one case, striking a major deal with its rival Boeing.

Singapore Airlines, the first to buy the A380, said on June 14 it would buy 20 Boeing 787-9 aircraft worth $4.52 billion and take options on another 20 planes.

May 2006

The first of the super jumbos are already coming off the production line.

On May 7, the first A380, which will be delivered to Singapore Airlines, underwent a 15-hour flight before landing at London's Heathrow Airport.

During five hours of ground testing, 474 passengers and 20 crew members simulated a 15 hours flight, during which they tried all cabin systems, such as the In-flight Entertainment System, the water and waste system and the air conditioning system.

Passengers on board the aircraft were given individual tasks to perform at certain intervals in order to simulate a maximum stress on certain cabin systems. Some passengers brought laptop computers to test the performance of the in-seat power supply.

While the tests were being carried out Richard Quest had a look around the aircraft.

He writes: "It does not appear very comfortable now but in six months, the first paying passengers will be settling into their seats aboard Singapore Airlines.

"The lucky ones will be sitting upstairs.

"For anyone who has flown in the exclusive bubble in a Boeing-747, the upper deck of the A380 is a very different animal. It is so much bigger. In fact, it is the width of any other main deck wide-bodied plane. And that puts it into perspective.

"The next six months will be very busy for Airbus as it prepares the A380 for its international debut. Until then, the plane is in Hamburg in Germany getting its cabin installed."

Airbus report that another milestone was reached when in Dresden, Germany, where fatigue tests on the A380 reached 10,000 flight cycles. The test examines the A380's structural behavior by simulating structural stresses over a very condensed period of time. The tests are performed in purpose built hangar equipped with hydraulic cylinders to simulate structural load. The tests in Dresden started in September 2005 and will continue to run to 2008 to simulate 47,500 flights in total, including short and long-haul missions.