A380 takeoff from Christchurch Airport

Emirates now offers daily flights between Christchurch and Sydney. At first, this might not sound like big news, until you take a look at the aircraft which will be hosting this service, namely the largest commercial passenger aircraft in the world. The A380, built by Airbus Industries, is a double-deck, quadruple-engined aircraft with a maximum range of 15,200 km and seating a maximum 544 passengers. The plane, powered by Rolls Royce Trent or Engine Alliance GP engines, requires reinforced and lengthened runways compared to most commercial crafts. Emirates Airlines  (Facebook page) is also well known for its fleet of 85 A380’s. Indeed, the airline’s home Airport of Dubai (DXB) (Facebook page) is strategically placed as a nexus point for the major flight destinations across the world. In fact, the A380’s range allows it to fly to any inhabited landmass on the planet  from Dubai, excluding some pacific islands, as shown by the chart below (blue areas include destinations within the plane’s range, from Dubai).

Here are some pictures of the second A380 airplane to takeoff from Christchurch International Airport on Tuesday 2nd November. I highly recommend checking Flight Aware or a similar website to check on the arrival and departure times, which to my knowledge are in the early afternoon and evening respectively, then drive down to the main runway to watch this behemoth in action. This spot by the road at the northern end of the runway is a great spot to watch it takeoff. I also think he plane may arrive or depart from the opposite direction depending on the wind direction.