We spent the afternoon visiting the facilities of Airbus, the manufacturer of such planes as the A330, A340 and the soon-to-be-released A380.
The tour began with an overview of the A380, which is the largest passenger airliner in the world and can seat over 850 passengers if configured with all economy seating. The various structural components for the A380 are built by various EU members and then are shipped and trucked to Toulouse for final assembly in the largest building of its kind in the world.
After the A380 portion of the tour we were then taken to see the supersonic airliner known as the Concorde.The Concorde is no longer in use having flown its last flight in 2003. We actually sat in the Concorde—unfortunately in a non-flying, parked state—while listening to our tour guide speak of its history and of the many technological hurdles that were required in order to make this plane a reality. The size of the Concorde is much smaller than I imagined it would be, and fits only 100 passengers.
For security reasons Airbus does not allow any photography on their tours and that is why we have no photos to go along with today’s blog entry.