the A380 has severe problems, not that airbus will admit to it...................rumours abound that it is over weight...............not true, it does however have a 50 ton fuel shortage due to fore & aft wing bending which means that they cannot put 50T of fuel on that they had planned on doing...........................
It won't even do Los Angeles - Hong Kong direct, Cathay did the figures and it falls into the Ocean about 30 minutes short of Hong Kong..................
The fact that they have created a new wake turbulence category doesn't help. An extra minute between take off's is going to make it a tad unpopular but not the end of the world..........................
what does finish it off is it can only use a 200ft wide runway.............so if your going to say, LHR, you can't use Stansted as an alternate, have to use Paris.................so you have to haul an extra 5-7 tons of gas for 13+ hours.................mmmmmmmmmm, not very cost effective really
Cathay learnt the lesson ..............Never be a lead customer for airbus, watch the others suffer for 5 years till they sort it out, then buy 747-800's