Air France introduces Paris-London A380 service

[sn26567]

Summer period: exceptional Air France Airbus A380 flights on London-heathrow to Paris-CDG route

• 12 June-30 August 2010
• UK passengers to trial flagship aircraft just from £80 return including all taxes included
• Large seating capacity to meet Summer demand

Air France announces that the Airbus A380, the world’s largest airliner, will exceptionally operate on the London-Heathrow airport to Paris-Charles de Gaulle route for the very first time from Saturday, 12th June 2010 until Monday, 30th August 2010. Therefore, customers will get the chance to trial the aircraft during this Summer period.

The Air France A380 will be assigned to flight numbers AF1980 (departure 10h05, arrival London 10h25) and AF1981 (departure London 12h50, arrival Paris 15h05) during all Summer weekends from Saturday to Monday, plus all Fridays in July.

For this special event, Air France has launched very attractive fares from just £80 return including all taxes on Economy Class, and from just £280* including all taxes on the Affaires/Business cabin class.

Says Henri Hourcade, General Manager, Air France KLM UK and Ireland, ‘We’re thrilled to have our flagship aircraft on the London to Paris route. The demand for our services from London during the Summer to France or to connect with our global network is always extremely high”.

Air France currently operates three double-decker A380s on the Paris-New York and Paris-Johannesburg routes.

Air France press release, Tuesday 18 May 2010

[BrightCedars]

Thanks, I've just booked myself a little event on a Sunday in July for 79€ return!

Can't wait to fly the A380!

[jan_olieslagers]

how come this has never been done with 747 or A340 then ? (or has it ?)

ISTR B707 operations BRU-LHR by SN in days long gone when 747's were not even available

[Bottie]

how come this has never been done with 747 or A340 then ? (or has it ?)

ISTR B707 operations BRU-LHR by SN in days long gone when 747's were not even available

IB did this also once with A346 between MAD and BRU a few years ago (I think )

[sn26567]

AIR FRANCE has cancelled planned Airbus A380 service on Paris CDG – London Heathrow service on 12JUL10. AF1980/1981, is to be operated by Airbus A321 on this date. (Source: airlineroute.net)

How many more such replacements in the future?

[purproot]

I was booked on this flight and only chose it fly on an A380!

Does anyone know if Air France will refund or reschedule the tickets?

[Desert Rat]

AF will do the LHR rotation with the A/C coming from JNB in the morning.

[sn26567]

AF1980/1981 CDG LHR on Saturday 24JUL10 is to be operated by 777-300ER instead of A380.

[Air Key West]

Never trust AF (at least, that's my experience).

[SN1203]

Never trust AF (at least, that's my experience).

With only 3 A380s in the fleet, it is a given that these LHR rotations will be swapped with other equipment from time to time. Or would you rather delay a longhaul A380 flight because you want to do a little hop to London first?

In case you have operational irregularities, you just swap the LHR flight with a standby aircraft that is able to transport all or at least as much as possible of the stranded passengers, has nothing to do with "never trusting an airline".

[Air Key West]

No, of course, I don't want to delay a long haul flight because I want to do a little hop to London first. Only, AF advertised the A380 London flights with very low fares, because, from what I understood (but correct me if I'm wrong) AF wanted to test the A380 with pax and make crew acquainted with the aircraft before operating the long haul fligths. Now, I assume quite a lot of people booked the cheap AF A380 London flights because they wanted to experience the A380. So, these people will feel cheated. But I know changes of aircraft are common practice. Only, I feel sorry for those people who went for the AF promotion. There isno recourse against AF. They fullfilled their contract : flying pax between Paris and London, but did they really fulfill their contract : did they not advertise the promotional fligths as flights to be operated with an A380 ? As for the rest, as I have said before, I avoid AF-KL whenever possible : too many bad experiences. Am always happy to give them some bad publicity. You may not share my opinion, but an increasing number of colleagues I talk too, agree with me.

[SN_fan]

I read a trip report on airliners.net were the A380 was swapped with an other equipment and the sales office called to ask if they had to rebook him on another flight which was operated with an A380 . It's an acceptable alternative I believe.

[pjvdv]

Last weekend, I've flown the A380 service.
17/07 ( F-HPJC ) the aircraft was on-time and an A380 and 18-07 ( F-HPJA ) we even had 2h25 delay.
But it was 2x A380 so everbody was happy and the load was +/- 100 % !

And as mentioned above, when they switch the equipment, you can rebook on another A380 flight to LHR !

I was pleased by the AF service as well.

Pieter-Jan

[regi]

Just met people who flew DUS-BKK with Emirates.Loading was okay, space was fine in economy but...it took 1 hour to get their luggage at BKK.
My time between landing ( B747 Qantas ) and passing through customs was < 30 minutes.

So it seems that is a bottle neck of the A380: the luggage of > 500 passengers appears on 1 luggage transporter.
( if they would use 2, you don't know where to look )

[sn26567]

So it seems that is a bottle neck of the A380: the luggage of > 500 passengers appears on 1 luggage transporter.
( if they would use 2, you don't know where to look )

They could use two: one for F and C, one for Y.

[regi]

So it seems that is a bottle neck of the A380: the luggage of > 500 passengers appears on 1 luggage transporter.
( if they would use 2, you don't know where to look )

They could use two: one for F and C, one for Y.

Hm,...yes, right, that is reasonable. Maybe they even did. Sadly enough the fact remains that the economy passengers had to wait 1 hour for their baggs.
Maybe it is too early to blame the massive passenger output. It can aslo just be a coincidence. I had to wait > 1 hour for baggs from a Gulf Air A340 at dreadful CDG.

[werkerke23]

So it seems that is a bottle neck of the A380: the luggage of > 500 passengers appears on 1 luggage transporter.
( if they would use 2, you don't know where to look )

They could use two: one for F and C, one for Y.

But they won't do that. It's not because belts 5&6 for example are aside each-other where passengers pick up their lugguage that the belts are aside each-other downstairs where they enter the circuit to get to the passengers...
It also depends on where the lost&found service of the airline is located: in BRU for example BA, KL, EY, ... use the belt which is the closest (don't remember the number anymore) to the l&f service as airlines don't want their angry passengers to search for 10 minutes for the office of l&f. That's also the reason why sometimes 4-5 flights are being unloaded at the same belt while on another belt there's not even 1 any flight being unloaded.