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By Bjorn Fehrm

Introduction

December 9, 2021, © Leeham News: Last week, we checked the economics for an airline that dispatches one A380 instead of two smaller widebodies on a trunk route with heavy traffic.

Our example was modeled after British Airways, which uses the A380 on its highest volume Heathrow departures. We modeled flights where we only considered the passenger payload and looked at operating costs. Now, we add cargo to the mix and look at the generated on the flights.

Summary

• The A380 was surprisingly competitive against the compared aircraft when we looked at passenger traffic.
• As expected, when cargo is added, the A380 competitiveness declines. It’s now a matter of what a slot more costs on the departure and destinations airports.