air wars
over the last few weeks, we saw Airbus and Boeing unveiling their new planes respectively. while the former unveiled the biggest ever, the latter tried to catch up by unveiling the longest non-stop flying machine ever, both for commercial purposes. both are technical marvels. I happened to watch a documentary on the making of A380, the superjumbo by Airbus. it was mind-blowing. the assembling factories are so huge that it took more than 2 yrs to just build them.
now coming to the main point, how comfortable are these aircrafts gonna be for a passenger. Its already taking more than 1 hr to just board the existing jumbojet - 747. I hoping that the airlines and airports would devise a clever way to board the 800 plus people on the A380, without too much delay. same goes with security and baggage claim as well.
ah, now comes Boeing's 777. while it sounds cool to read that it can fly 11,000 miles non-stop in 18 hrs, in reality, its a pain in the neck to travel that kind of distance in one stretch. The longest I have flown non-stop is about 15 hrs, from Los Angeles to Taipei. and everytime I do this, at the end I feel like killing someone :) its not worth it at all.
lets see how these two come up in the next few yrs :)
and the trade wars between Boeing and Airbus is even more interesting :)
11 Comments:
I don't think these are anywhere near customer ease than trade wars and oneupmanship...but I truely admire the wonder of airbus...it is said that, if such a factory has to be in India, then our roads wouldnt be enough to carry even the building materials required...let alone the finished product....the real fight has jus begun...after Doughlas n other US gaints, its the time for airbus to challenge the boeing....I only hope n pray it wins...BTW, I jus blogrolled u...
Krish, airbus is winning the war right now. currently its the market leader on commercial carriers. boeing is still holding up because of military contracts.
True, Boeing is far ahead when it comes to military planes..I think US will never let boeing go down..simply because, it has been the primary arms supplier and one of the major foreign policy influencers on the american scene...Boeing is already US's major arms exporter and its a open knowledge, that US makes helluva money in arms sales...
A friend of mine was working in A380 project sometime back. About 3 yrs back, when we were travelling together, he explained in detail abt the project, the places where the works are being held et al. The wings were designed at Bristol in UK, where he was working that time..
He was explaining all this to me throughout the flight journey to India and I was listening awestruck. When the final product was unveiled last week, couldn't help thinking abt him..
Well... coming to the customer ease.. I think this industry has more examples. Look at Concorde... supersonic jet - wd fly to NY from London in less than 3 hrs - technological marvel - all that is fine.. look at the cost. even the filthy rich found it expensive to use that BA had to ground it down forever.
Any technology developed without havin the end-user in mind is bound to meet that fate.
A380 reminds me of Howard Hughes' "Spruce Goose". Built in 1945 and still the largest plane ever, it could've carried 750 passengers.
Airbus has already been in the fray when it comes to non-stop long range flights. A cupla months back I took the Singapore Airlines non-stop flight (A340) from LAX to SIN - thats 9000 miles in 16hrs. Pretty long, that, but down a few drinks and watch a few movies droopy eyed, and you can sleep through the journey undisturbed :)
Jagan
I agree. Longer journeys are fun by train than the plane.
And I can do as much as 9-10 hours at a stretch in flight- no more. There'isnt even enough stretching space (obviously I am talking about economy).
As long as bigger planes dont translate into more expensive tickets, I am game.
thats right chakra, hope they learn their lesson from concorde. and I saw that wing design too, at Bristol, UK :)
Gandalf, I really admire your patience :) by the way, do those non-stop flights to Singapore cost more than the regular one-stop flights? and are you a LA native??
Jagan, ennamo poda :) unlike a lot of people, I tend to sleep really well on trains :)
Ranga, namakkum kaalam varum, one day we will also fly in first class :)
and probably thats why we sleep during lot of movies :) aaah, now I know the reason why we sleep at the movies :)
that 'track sound'is like "thaalaattu" for me :)
if u notice.. unlike other industries these 2 giants beleive in a different future direction/philosophy - Airbus thinks that longhaul transcontinental behemoth flights are the future, while boeing thinks no traveler would want to wait with 500 others to board or look for baggage with them hence the smaller quieter fuel-saving plane.
Contrastingly, pepsi and coke came up with vanilla versions almost together; verizon came up with a replica plan of cingular (w/o the rollover); Creative, Apple and Sandisk all come up a flash memory based version of their mp3 player.
cant these guys think originally?
harish, that depends on the market you have at hand. consumer market is highly volatile and time to market is a critical issue. with a cut throat competition, its bound to happen. soda drinkers easily change their mind, but not the ones who spend hundreds of dollars on airline tickets.
With A380, its either a win all or loose all situation for Airbus. they have taken that risk knowingly. pretty bold indeed.
As announced by Singapore Airlines, the non-stop flight is supposed to cost the same as any other.
I was in Irvine for a while, not LA, but now I've been more of a vagabond in the Jersey/Philly area.
The rhythm of the train track was definitely music. Especially if you've slept on the compartment floor with a few sheets of paper for a bed :P And throw in some thrills travelling on the roof top of the coach (happens all the time in UP-Haryana-Rajasthan routes).
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