The size of Singapore Airlines’ new A380 is apparent long before you reach the departure gate – there’s a long, long Economy check-in line at the Singapore Airlines desk. It snakes around and back on itself, bringing home the fact you are about to be launched into the air with 470 fellow travellers in a plane 50 per cent bigger than its nearest rival, the Boeing 747.
But this is the return leg of the inaugural commercial journey of Airbus’s new wunderkind so everyone is so happy that the queue may as well be a giant conga line and the jazz quartet playing nearby gives it all a touch of wedding-reception class. In fact the whole airport is abuzz: flags announcing the plane’s inaugural flight line the taxi drop-off, special signs guide passengers around the airport maze, even the usually surly immigration officers seems excited for me.
I remain unsure. Anyone who says they are not a “transportation enthusiast” usually protests too much, but I have to say that planes, in and of themselves, have never been my thing. I’m more a destinations kind of guy – but at the departure gate I catch glimpse of the A380 and finally get in touch with my inner plane spotter.
She’s a physically imposing plane, not jet-sleek and sexy but with a large, blunt beauty like an ocean liner. The new plane is so big that each airport that accepts her has to fit out a special gate with two air bridges for the upper and lower decks. While some 747s have upper-deck bubbles the A380 is the first airliner to have a second tier run the full length of the fuselage.
When I arrive at the gate – which is decked out in neon yellow to emphasise the importance of the occasion - a champagne reception is in full swing, populated with a wide range of guests: assorted dignitaries; overexcited enthusiasts in specially made jackets emblazoned with “First to fly”; dignified septagenarians in gold-buttoned blazers with the sort of seriously coiffed moustache that almost qualifies you to fly a plane. All around, enough cameras flash to blind a hotel heiress.
In the speeches, much is made of the progress, the importance of air travel, man’s dominance of the skies and general cleverness. This clearly angers Mother Nature and in a mini Titanic moment she throws in a few flashbulbs of her own; one hell of a thunderstorm that grounds the plane for the next two and half hours. Never forget who is in charge.
Finally we board and the wait is forgotten as we see the interior and take in the plane’s enormity. The A380 could happily eat other planes and have space for dessert and petit fours – and this sense of space is the plane’s big selling point. The windows are a similar size to other planes but their design allows in more light; and the whole thing has a pleasant odour that one can only describe as “new plane smell”.
I have been fortunate enough to snag a business class seat on this flight, the proceeds of which Singapore Airlines has been kind enough to donate to charities including Sydney’s two children’s hospitals at Westmead and Randwick. Singapore has opted for a one-two-one seat configuration in Business and due to the A380’s dimensions this makes the seats more like airborne couches. Each business class seat is like a self-contained capsule with neat finishing touches such as a glasses case and a screen bigger than the first television I owned. Singapore Airlines CEO Chew Choon Sing told me, as he worked his way through the cabin, that the almost obscenely large seats were introduced after the airline decided to change First Class to the much publicised Suites – effectively flying bedrooms. “Once you have upped First, you have to up Business,” he said.
And the same applies to economy. Economy class seats have more room, due to both space and canny design. They also have 10-inch screens and a wider range of entertainment; and clever touches like personal lights that come from beneath the screen rather than glowing overhead like a fog light.
At take-off another impressive feature is demonstrated, the four Rolls Royce Trent 900 engines that power the new Airbus. We have all been told it is quieter but, sitting over the wing, I was genuinely shocked at how quiet. I was sure these babies were holding back and I was waiting for the full noise of the engines to kick in – I kept waiting, all the way to Changi airport. Leichhardt rejoice.
To review the food would be simply unfair as we were treated to a special menu by two of Singapore Airlines’s culinary panel, Australia’s Matt Moran of Aria restaurant and Singapore’s Sam Leong, that won’t be on all flights, but it was as opulent as its surrounds.
After a short turn around in Singapore my history-making flight is put into neat, if unintentional, perspective on the return trip. It is back to economy on the 747 and it is not one of the newest in the fleet. Knees ache, trays nudge my sleeping neighbour (a bodybuilder no less!) and nature once again has a cheeky hand in the proceedings. At Mascot, a sudden cross wind makes our landing so abrupt that a set of overhead reading lights falls from the ceiling in front of us, left to dangle from their wires.
No-one is hurt and cabin crew scramble to assure all is well, but I can’t help smiling to myself and thinking this would never happen on the A380. I make a mental note to secure it for my next long-haul flight. There has been a lot of hype about this being the future of air travel, but for once the buzz is not for nothing.
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