Greetings from KLM Flight 652. This 2006 model Airbus A330-200 (PH-AOF) will take me across the Atlantic tonight to Amsterdam headed for Toulouse to spend a few days with Airbus. Thursday morning will feature a comprehensive day-long briefing on the A350 XWB, which coincidentally coincides with the EADS third quarter earnings release.
The last time I was in Toulouse, Airbus was still selecting supplier partners for the aircraft and today those suppliers are feverishly working to complete and deliver parts to final assembly. The program’s schedule will be the centerpiece of the discussions on Thursday, but beyond that the spectre of the A380 and 787 loom large. Seeing how the company and its relationship with its diverse engineering corps, suppliers and customers interact and solve the program’s challenges are seen as the key to learning the lessons of the last two clean sheet widebody jetliners. More as the week unfolds. Time to fly.
This post was originally published to the internet between 2007 and 2012. Links, images, and embedded media from that era may no longer function as intended.
This post originally appeared at Flightglobal.com from 2007 to 2012.