Air Bus 380 Qantas

Span: 18"
Length: 16"

The 555 seat, double deck Airbus A380 is the most ambitious civil aircraft program yet. When it enters service in March 2006, the A380 will be the world's largest airliner, easily eclipsing Boeing's 747.

The Airbus A380 flew for the first time on April 27, 2005. The Airbus A380 is a double-deck, four-engined airliner manufactured by EADS (Airbus S.A.S.).The airline features an advanced version of the Airbus common two crew cockpit, with pull-out keyboards for the pilots, extensive use of composite materials such as GLARE (an aluminum/glass fiber composite), and four 302 to 374kN (68,000 to 84,000lb) class Rolls-Royce Trent 900 or Engine Alliance (General Electric/Pratt & Whitney) GP7200 turbofans now under development.

Qantas (Qantas Airways Limited) is the name and call sign of the national airline of Australia. Qantas is also the world's third oldest continuously running airline and is the 13th largest airline in the world by passenger numbers. The name was originally "QANTAS", an acronym for "Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services". The company is based in Sydney, New South Wales and it is Australia's largest airline. It is traded on the Australian Securities Exchange as ASX: QAN. Qantas (second to fly A380) has announced it will use the A380, in a 450-seat configuration, on its Melbourne and Sydney to Los Angeles and Melbourne and Sydney to London routes.