6.03pm (Dubai time): TOUCHDOWNWe’ve finally landed. And parked at gate F12. Several hundred people are swarming around the plane in admiration. We were late landing because we’ve been circling around Dubai to show the plane off to everyone. The pilot forgot to mention that to us, as he also forgot to mention that soon after taking off we would go back towards Hamburg Airport at low altitude so the Germans could get another look at the plane.
PS Malcolm Taylor made a full recovery… 4.45pm (Dubai time):Sorry about the radio silence but we’ve been busy enjoying the finest food Emirates has to offer with the morello cherry for dessert being the stand-out offering. We’re due to land in Dubai in about 45 minutes. I’ll be back in touch when we land.
3.05pm (Dubai time): The extended interviews with Tim Clark and Sheikh Ahmed will appear in Arabian Business on Sunday, including also a chat with Airbus boss Tom Enders. I hope you’ve enjoyed my live commentary from the A380 as much as I’ve enjoyed my time in the air.
2pm (Dubai time): Emirates wants to lose two tonnes from its aircraft and “everything” is under consideration. “We are looking at the carpets, the curtains on windows and even the suit racks,” says Tim Clark.
Yesterday we revealed that footrests have been ditched in Economy – I suspect this is just the beginning. “Even the touch screens weigh 2kg, we could maybe lose a kilo there,” says Tim.
And what does he make of all the delays on this project? “I’d rather get a delayed plane with no problems than one on time with loads of problems. Look, Airbus are spending longer on getting the job right but I am right behind them. What do you do in these situations? The show must go on.” 1.10pm (Dubai time):I’m told the flight is due to land at 5.23pm (local time) in Dubai.
Mike Simon, the Emirates corporate communications chief tells me he is off to write a fiction novel called Aquarius about the Gulf’s deserts running out of water.
1pm (Dubai time): Oh how I wish I was rich. That First Class is so cool. The best thing about it is that it even has a private shower on board!
There are two of these fully equipped cabins on board for the super rich. There are 14 flat bed private suites, each with remote controlled doors, a work desk and an electronically controlled mini bar.
Anyway, back to this shower (which I am obsessed with). What I want to know is how long you get in there. What if you paid all that money to fly First Class only to find someone in the shower for three hours?
No fears. The shower is set on a timer of just five minutes, and you can only spend 25 minutes in total inside. I dread to think what happens if you are still inside after 25 minutes. Do the doors fling open to humiliate you? I don’t know, but I know a man who does – Emirates president Tim Clark, who has popped over.
So Tim, what happens after 25 minutes? “Well my advice to you is not to spend too long shampooing your hair,” he tells me. (He’s a 2 in 1 man I reckon, conditioner and shampoo combined).
11.40am (Dubai time): His Highness Sheikh Ahmed, chairman of Emirates Airline, has joined us for a chat. (I was going to ask him for a temporary loan as it’s costing me $5 a minute to send this stuff over, but that’s probably unwise).
Instead I discussed the future for Emirates. Did HH really think he would see this day? “Yes I never doubted,” he says, adding: “Maybe you had sleepless nights but I didn’t. There was actually never a time when I thought this day wouldn’t come.”
So given this day is two years late, he must be a very patient man? “Yes I am very patient but I can also be very pushy,” he tells me.
We rattled through a lot of subjects. Here are some of his key comments.
On rising ticket prices: “That is something we cannot do anything about. At the end of the day we have to charge people whatever the cost is plus our profit.”
On whether Emirates will meet its annual profit targets he says “we still have until March.”
Is there anything a man like him, who has practically everything, still wants? “Yes, I want oil prices to go down!”
You can read the full Sheikh Ahmed interview on Sunday in Arabian Business magazine. In the meantime I’m off for another wander – this time to the First Class suites (Tim Clark will be here in 20 minutes).
11am (Dubai time): If I had my eyes shut, I would have no idea we had taken off – this plane seems virtually silent. Incredible engineering, whoever did all this. My jeep makes more noise driving through Bur Dubai.
To be precise, this plane manages 3.1 litres of fuel per 100 passenger kms. Compare that to the Toyota Prius Hybrid which runs at 4.4 litres per 100 vehicle km. (please don’t ask me to explain).
Anyway, the point is we are approaching 43,000 feet and I had no idea till someone just told me. I’m also told that Sheikh Ahmed is about 30 minutes away from coming to say hello to Arabian Business readers. In the meantime I’m going for a wander around this big baby.
10.15am (Dubai time): If you’re wondering what I have been doing for the past 15 minutes, the answer is nothing apart from trying to figure out how to use all these fancy stuff on my seat.
The seat is in some kind a shell, with just a single seat on each side of the plane and two in the middle (in business class). Nice stuff.
There is a 17inch wide LCD screen, and something called “Touch Screen Wireless Intergrated Passenger Seat Controller.” It’s all a bit complex for me, I actually quite like those planes where you only get three channels. This one has 190 movie channels, 100 TV channels and 700 Audio Channels – basically every single movie and song you ever heard of. Or so they claim.
I notice three of the greatest albums ever made are not available – Fantastic (Wham! 1983), Make it Big (Wham! 1984), The Edge of Heaven (Wham! 1986). Okay okay, I know The Edge of Heaven is technically not an album as it only has four tracks, but it’s still a classic. We’re about to take off so I have to log off for a while.
10am (Dubai time): We’re on board and I have just one word to say – wow! The first thing that strikes you is just how massive this piece of kit is.
As Airbus boss Tom Enders told me yesterday, there are four million different parts to this plane and 500km of wiring. In fact, it is so big it had to be assembled in 4 different countries before coming to Hamburg, where all the internal fittings have been done.
And boy have they done a good job. The entire bottom deck is Economy Class with 399 seats (I’ve no idea who’s sitting there), with 76 seats in Business Class and 14 in First. The whole top deck is for business and first, and right at the end of the plane is a fully equipped bar and lounge area. I was going to say that it looks a bit like the one on Virgin Upper Class but I would be wrong – it looks exactly the same. Still, no point re-inventing the wheel.
Once we take off I will have a snoop look around and report back. I’ve just spotted Sheikh Ahmed, who is on board with Emirates Airline president Tim Clarke. For a couple of guys who have spent $12bn on these planes and so far only this one is ready, they look remarkably calm! I’ll be chatting to both of them in a couple of hours time, somewhere over Turkey, so stay tuned for that.
9.50am (Dubai time): So here we go then. Well, nearly – it’s off to the Airbus delivery centre. I’m sitting next to Malcolm Taylor from Dubai Eye, who I have to say isn’t looking that happy.
He had a “medical problem” on the flight over, the details of which I can´t reveal (unless you email me on [email protected] and I will reply in complete confidence). Malcolm also missed most of the sightseeing as he got the wrong schedule, and so spent several hours yesterday having lunch with himself. Still it´s not all bad for him – he has just proudly told me that he isn’t infact the first Taylor to fly over Germany – his dad did so in 1943. Sorry pal, I´m not sure this is a conversation I want to continue!! Oh, a quick hello to Sandra from Emirates Cabin Crew, who is doing promotional work on this trip. She tells me her dad is reading this blog back home in Paris. Bonjour Monsieur.
And before we take off, Bob from Doha has texted me to ask how it is we are able to bring you this live coverage from inside the plane. Bob, its called the internet. Check it out mate!
Around 70 journalists are on board this flight, though we have lost many of the VIPs who were in town yesterday, including Boris Becker. What does he do these days? I’m sure I saw him at a freebie in Dubai recently.
8am (Dubai time) Hamburg Airport: I have a confession to make – I’m afraid of heights. Bit late I know, as I’ll shortly be boarding the new Emirates Airline A380, on the airline’s first ever fully customised flight.
The journey from Hamburg to Dubai should take around five hours, during which time I will be bringing readers of Arabian Business live and exclusive coverage from inside the aircraft.
Everything you ever wanted to know about the A380, such as how many showers are on board to, more importantly, how big the telly is, will shortly be revealed.
Emirates boss Sheikh Ahmed has promised to join me for some of the flight, and we have a host of other Emirates and Airbus top dogs, so watch out for some exclusive comments from them on their big day.
No expense has been spared on this trip, with 58 promotional girls flown over from Dubai just for the launch.
Because of my busy schedule I’ve only managed to speak to 53 of them. Still, there is plenty of time to go before we land in Dubai.
The excitement has been building here in Hamburg for the past four days, as we get set for this long awaited journey.
How important is today for Emirates? Very. The whole Airbus A380 project was launched in 1999, it’s cost around $12 billion – that’s $4 billion more than anyone expected, and it’s two years late. Emirates has ordered 58 of these big babies, so it sure needs them to be a hit.
As we fly across Germany, over Hungary, the Balkans, a bit of Turkey and then over Iran before making our descent into Dubai, I will also be punching out several A380 facts – beginning with this: The first ever flight by the Wright brothers was shorter than the distance between the wings of the A380. I bet you didn’t know that did you?
One other fact someone has just pointed out to me: The first ever seat on a commercial flight of the A380 (for Singapore Airlines last year) was sold on ebay for $98,000. That´s a bit more than I paid…
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