Airbus is preparing to offer incoming US president Barack Obama a special A380 superjumbo to replace the ageing Air Force One Boeing 747 jumbo jet.
Tom Enders, chief executive, said the US was already thinking about new aircraft for the presidential fleet and it was “not completely absurd” to consider the superjumbo as an alternative. It can carry as many as 840 passengers and is the European plane-maker’s flagship, with one sold to a Gulf sheikh.
But Enders said it was “much too early to speculate” and Airbus was concentrating on winning the re-run $40bn (£27bn) Pentagon contract for 179 air-to-air refuelling (tanker) aircraft against Boeing.
Airbus won the contract last year after one of the fiercest lobbying battles ever witnessed on Capitol Hill, but the Pentagon later revised the tender under congressional pressure. Enders said Airbus had won that contest fairly and intended to win again – provided it was on a level playing field…
The A380, which has won 198 orders from 16 customers, is the world’s biggest plane, but Airbus claims it is at least 25% more fuel-efficient than the venerable 747 and emits far fewer greenhouse gases – a key Obama preoccupation.
Enders really is a ballbuster with style.
No F’ing-way.
A: I, as a taxpayer, do not want to foot the bill for that thing…
B: The President doesn’t need it…
C: What does it say to the World when the US President will not choose to fly around in a design produced by his own country?
~ Sen. Obama, meet Boeing 777
“Tom Enders, chief executive, said the US was already thinking about new aircraft for the presidential fleet”
Would be interesting but:
A) That statement is not true.
B) Airbus doesn’t posses the needed military tech to pull it off.
Cripes #2 – even Fox Snooze has covered A) and B). Still getting all your news from My Weekly Reader?
#1
A 777 is smaller than a 747.
If Boeing wasn’t constantly dealing with strikes and quality issues the 787 might be a viable option, but there’s nothing wrong with Airbus aircraft. Aircraft need to be refitted after so many flight hours and the current Air Force One is getting pretty old.
I don’t know how the production would work if they made a single Air Force One A380, but with the new tankers the plan was to bring the parts over from Europe and do all the manufacturing and militarization in the US at the EADS and Northrop Grumman facilities in Alabama.
# 3 moss said, “Cripes #2 – even Fox Snooze has covered A) and B)”
It would be quite impossible for any news site to cover “B” as they don’t posses the knowledge.
Nice try though.
The Boeing 747-8 – FTW.
If they didn’t haul a back cabin full of reporters, they wouldn’t need such a large aircraft.
I was under the impression that whatever plane the president was on at any given time was Air Force One…
Ah, #2…Your Mam let you out, this morning, without tying your shoes or buttoning up your brain, I see.
..although I can’t find the information, I thought the A380 had runway length requirements that shut it out of many US airports making it rather inviable as an Air Force jet.
This is a moot point, the development time needed for such an endeavor would take more than 8 years let alone the 4 years Obama will have in office. Obama will never set foot in it till after his Presidency is finished.
did he say “level playing field”? what a sick f’n joke that is… never has there ever been a more subsidized company… if this country continues to stick to the out dated ideal of “free trade” and so called “free markets” the republic will fall. if we continue to open our markets to euro/asian nationalist state subsidized “companies” while we can barely sell them a light bulb… they’ll be no one left working in the country… period
this would be exactly what a stupid ass liberal would do…buy something produced by a european conglomerate and spend hundreds of millions of someone elses money to do so…I bet Obama tricks out airforce one just like the one in soul plane…I bet he will even hire snoop as his chief pilot…
Moot point. That silly uber-jumbo can’t land on most runaways, and only a few major super hubs have spent the money to modify their concourses and jetways to deal with that goofy thing. So a A380 Air Force One couldn’t land on all but a few runways in the U.S. (forget about stopping in New Orleans after a flood). The 747 needs a good long runway, but can land and unload everywhere from Moline Illinois (Quad Cities) to Chicago and Memphis.
A. The 2 747s we have are less than 20 years old and in perfectly good shape.
B. Um, we’re in a recession.
C. Airbus is French, and Boeing’s biggest competitor.
I don’t get it. What’s wrong with a new Boeing 747, either 400 series or the new -8? American made for an American President which would be paid for with American tax money? Is that too difficult to figure out?
It wouldn’t surprise me if they do buy the Airbus and then on the next day ask us to support the big 3 and buy American.
Watch Boeing put up a 747-800 version. I just can’t see Airbus being used to represent the US, as it flys around the world.
Sorry.
Hey! Boeing needs a BAILOUT!!!!!!!
P.S. So do I !!!!
You guys really gobbled it up bait, hook, line and sinker…
This post is only here because of the photoshopped picture of the AF1…
or did you ever think the Presidential plane would be anything else than an American plane?
PS.
Airbus is not french: it’s a conglomerate owned 80% by EADS (Matra from france, CASA from Spain and DaimlerChrysler from Germany) and 20% by BAE Systems (British aerospace and Marconi).
The current 747s used by the President don’t get the kind of flight hours that one gets flying for United.
Yes, any Air Force plane the President is on is called Air Force One. Marine aircraft, Marine One just like the S-3 Viking Bush flew onto the carrier with was called Navy One.
Who givs two shit about the A380 anyway. Too damn big.
Please buy the AirBus. They size/performance of the aircraft would keep them out of my county!
“The current 747s used by the President don’t get the kind of flight hours that one gets flying for United.”
Military aircraft also have a much more rigid maintenance regime than commercial aircraft do.
Even though technically it could make sense to buy an Airbus, it would certainly be difficult to defend it from a political standpoint… My guess is Obama wouldn’t do it. #1’s opinion proves my point and it makes sense.
As for #2, where the hell did you get b) from?
Apparently there are not too many bloggers here who actually UNDERSTAND the commercial aircraft industry. Boeing aircraft use wings made in china, engines made in England, etc. Airbus aircraft use avionics made in the U.S., wings made in Ireland, etc. There is no such thing as a domestic or foreign aircraft manufacturer anymore, they are all multinational.
BTW, I have flown in the A380 and it is a truly amazing aircraft!
Tom
Chances are with all those delays that the one who will enjoy that new presidential airplane is going to be the one who will win the 2012 Presidential election.
It may be an amazing aircraft but hasn’t Airbus had a problem with the actual structure of their craft (composite delamination, falling engines).
There is no way an A380 burns less fuel than a 747-400.
The A380 burns less fuel PER passenger-mile, but that’s based on 550 passengers.
But Air Force One is not a packed plane filled with vacationers.
In reality, every hour and every mile, an A380 burns 20% more fuel than a 747-400, and that’s the current model, not the planned increased efficiency -8 version which will be another 16% more efficient than the -400.
The President will soon be flying in a British/Italian made Marine One helicopter. I guess it only makes sense to now have a German/French/British made Air Force One.
Heck, even replacing our entire fleet of air refueling tankers was awarded to Airbus (although it is currently on hold pending further review).
The concept of using American tax dollars on American products is over. “Buy American” is a dead in Congress.
Next thing you know, the Presidential Limo will be a Mercedes Benz.
#8. Not to get over technical, the plane that the president gets on is not automatically called Air Force 1.
When the B747 does not have the President on board, it is called “Venus XX” (known from past experience). When the president boards an Air Force aircraft, it becomes known as Air Force One. He boards a Marine aircraft, it becomes known as Marine One, and so on with the other services. If he boards a civilian aircraft, it becomes “Executive One, as per FAA Order 7110.65, chapter two.
# 25 Miguel Correia said, “As for #2, where the hell did you get b) from?”
There is no country in the EU that has the technical capacity to manufacture military aviation tech to the level of the US. Pretty simple.