A380 superjumbos will be back on Saurday

AFP: Qantas said on Tuesday that two of its six Airbus A380 planes would resume flying on Saturday, three weeks after a mid-air engine blast triggered serious safety concerns over the world's biggest passenger jet.

Chief executive Alan Joyce said flights would resume with a Sydney to London flight via Singapore, adding that Qantas was working with Airbus and British engine-maker Rolls-Royce to get the other A380s back in service.

"We're completely comfortable with the operation of the aircraft," Joyce told reporters.

"We're working with Airbus and Rolls-Royce on what it will take to get the (other) aircraft back in the air," he added.

Joyce said the Australian flag-carrier was taking delivery of two more A380s, also with Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines, by the end of the year, with another two early in 2011.

But he said the giant double-decker aircraft would not be used on the trans-Pacific Los Angeles route until the company was "100 per cent sure" the problems had been resolved.

Joyce added that Qantas was being 'very conservative' with the re-introduction of the aircraft.

Qantas grounded its A380s after the November 4 scare when one of an A380's four engines blew up minutes into a flight from Singapore to Sydney, damaging a wing and scattering debris, and forcing an emergency return to the city-state.

Singapore Airlines has grounded three of its 11 A380s and Lufthansa is changing an engine on one of its superjumbos as a precaution, while other A380 operators use engines from another manufacturer.

The incident cast a shadow over the A380, which weighs 560 tonnes at takeoff and can carry as many as 853 passengers, and was hailed as the future of long-haul aviation at its commercial launch in 2007.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/43764" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: &lt;a&gt; &lt;em&gt; &lt;strong&gt; &lt;cite&gt; &lt;code&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;ol&gt; &lt;li&gt; &lt;dl&gt; &lt;dt&gt; &lt;dd&gt;</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-4695bd5caa5c164658d4032c3f277d3b" value="form-4695bd5caa5c164658d4032c3f277d3b" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="89568025" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>

No Articles Found

No Articles Found

No Articles Found

I want to begin with a little story that was told to me by a leading executive at Aptech. He was exercising in a gym with a lot of younger people.

Shekhar Kapur’s Bandit Queen didn’t make the cut. Neither did Shaji Karun’s Piravi, which bagged 31 international awards.