By reducing the number of classes to two from three, Emirates will beat its previous maximum of 517 seats on A380s plying medium-haul routes. The first superjumbos it deployed featured only 489 seats on longer-distance flights.
While the A380 is cleared to carry 853 people in a single-class layout and is being pushed by Airbus as a high-capacity workhorse, most operators have deployed it as a luxury flagship.
Air Austral, which specified a 840-seat design, has no firm delivery date, leaving 652-seaters ordered by Russia’s Transaero Airlines as set to mark the next peak should it take the planes.
Emirates began Copenhagen flights in 2011 with Airbus Group NV A330 wide-bodies before moving to larger Boeing Co. 777s. “Based on strong load factors, we are happy to further upgrade the route,” President Tim Clark said in a statement.
With its fleet of 59 A380s -- out of 140 it has ordered -- Emirates has siphoned inter-continental traffic through its Dubai hub and away from European legacy carriers including Deutsche Lufthansa AG and Air France-KLM Group.
The Gulf carrier will offer one A380 flight a day to Copenhagen starting in December, providing Scandinavia’s first superjumbo service. The aircraft will feature 58 flat-bed berths in business class and 557 seats in economy, giving a total capacity of 4,305 passengers a week in each direction.
Leading local operator SAS AB doesn’t serve the route.
(Deena Kamel - Bloomberg Business)
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