Flight Review - British Airways A380 in Economy Class

Hello there, and welcome to another trip report. This post is long over due and will showcase a flight I took in November 2021 with British Airways on their A380 in economy class. 

As a result of the Covid pandemic, BA, along with most of the worlds airlines, grounded the majority of their long-haul fleet as demand for passenger travel evaporated. Most of BA's A380s ended up being mothballed in Teruel, Spain, as the weather is perfect for storing aircraft. In October 2021, with the demand for passenger travel finally beginning to tick up, BA announced that they would be bringing the mighty whale back to the skies, with flights starting back in November 2021 between London and certain European cities for crew familiarisation, before being put back on long-haul routes. One of these intra-European routes would be from London's Heathrow airport (LHR) to Frankfurt Main (FRA) in Germany. With German airline Lufthansa also being an A380 operator, and with Frankfurt having recieved daily A380 flights from Emirates, Korean Air, Asiana and Singapore Airlines pre-pandemic, this was the perfect route for these flights. 
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This flight was a no-brainer for me. Having never flown on an A380 before, and having the opportunity to take a flight on one so close to home, I had to do it. I went on to the BA website to look at the schedule, and it so happened that the A380 was flying the LHR-FRA-LHR route the day before my birthay, now I had a proper excuse. I booked the A380 flight, and then booked a cheap early morning flight with Lufthansa from Dublin to Frankfurt and an Aer Lingus flight from Heathrow back to Dublin. Three flights in one day, with one being an A380, the perfect day!

The day of departure finally rolled around, and I took my flight to Frankfurt with Lufthansa. Once arriving in Frankfurt, I made my wat to the BA check-in desk to recieve my boarding pass. Online check-in was unavailable at this time, as vaccination and travel locator forms were still required and checked by staff before boarding tickets could be issued. 

Check-in took longer than expected, and even though I had a three hour layover before continuing on to London, I made my way to security as soon as possible. I've been to Frankfurt many times, and even though I knew passenger numbers were still below where they were in 2019, I wasn't taking a chance - Frankfurt security can be an absolute nightmare!!

Through security, I made my way straight to the departure gate to ensure I got a view of the whale landing and making the taxi in. Despite it being a miserable and foggy day in Frankfurt, that didn't dampen spirits and you could feel the buzz and excitment build at the gate as the aircraft came into view. 

G-XLEG would be the aircraft doing the honours today. Delivered new to British Airways in Setember 2014, she is one of 12 A380's in the fleet. With a configuration of 14 suites in First Class, 97 lie-flat bed seats in Club World, and 199 standard seats in World Traveller on the main deck, the upper deck consisted of 55 recliner seats in World Traveller Plus and 104 standard seats in World Traveller. The upper deck was closed for todays flight, however the crew did provide tours of the upper deck once we were in the cruise. 

My seat for todays flight was 40K, all the way down the back of Economy on the main deck. The seats are in a 3-4-3 layout back here and I was luck to have the three seats to myself for this short flight of just over 1 hour. The seats have a width of 17.5 inches and with a pitch of 31 inches, this was more the sufficient for a small guy like me. The entertainment box for the IFE is under the seat in front, which can be quite annoying, however there is a bit of room between the aircraft wall and the seat which I found great to put my right leg when stretching out. Each seat had it's own IFE screen, earphone jack and USB charging port, which were all fully operational throughout the entire flight. 

During the boarding process, the crew we absolutely amazing. You could tell the majority of people on todays flight were primarily on it just to fly the A380 and the crew were feeding off this excitment. You could tell they were thrilled to be back flying on the mighty whale, and it really did feel like a corner had been turned in the Pandemic.

Below is a video of our departure from Frankfurt, I hope you enjoy the sound of those Rolls Royce Trent 900 engines spooling up, I know I did :) Every time I see an A380 take off, I'm always amazed at the engineering and physics behind powered flight, and just how gracefully this aircraft gets into the air. On the takeoff roll, and even though it was slow and steady, you could still feel how much power the aircraft had at its disposal. It really was a graceful and comfortable take off. 

Once in the air, the crew jumped into action with the on-board service. With limited services still being provided, and it being just over a one hour flight, we were gived a bottle of still water and a packed of crisps. Perfect for such a short sector. 

I spent the rest of the flight just enjoying being on such a mamoth aircraft. It had been nearly 10 years since I flew on my last Boeing 747, also with British Airways, so being on such a massive wide-body and not having to fly far was a real treat! Here are some views from the cruise:

Before long, we began to make our approach into a miserable Heathrow airport, and our flight would soon be coming to an end. Below is a video of our approach and landing in Heathrow. 

Once we had parked up at the gate and during disembarking process, I asked a memeber of the cew if it was possible to get a view of the cockpit.. if you never ask you'll never know. They of course obliged and I was able to sit in the right hand seat and get a photo. I was like a child in a sweet shop, I couldn't have been happier!!

To sum up my flight, it was such a unique experience to fly on such a big aircraft on such a short flight. The crew knew how special the flight was and what it represented, for both their company and aviation geeks alike. Their willingness to engage to with the passengers to the extent that they did, is unrivalled and something I haven't experienced since. I hoep to get to fly on an A380 again in the future, but if I don't, I still have the above picture to bring me back to this great day. 

Thank you so much for reading this post, I do hope you liked it. I have since flown on another British Airways wide-body between Frankfurt and London, any regular viewers of my Instagram account will know what I'm talking about here, and this will be my next blog post. 

Until then, take care. Daniel - TheRegHunter.