China Southern Airlines has retired its last two Airbus A380s, marking the type’s complete exit from the Chinese market after more than a decade of operations.
In its half-year financial report, the Guangzhou-based carrier – China’s only A380 operator – says it exited the two aircraft during the first half of 2023. In February 2022, reports emerged that the airline was looking to dispose of its A380s by the end of that year, after chalking up heavy losses in the years of operation. In April 2021, a senior airline executive said China Southern was reviewing the future of the type, acknowledging the uncertainty about the international recovery, coupled with high operating costs. The airline’s first A380 was delivered in 2011, three years later than original projections, and began flying to Los Angeles in 2012. China Southern was said to be incurring millions of dollars in A380-related losses, before a change in scheduling helped the type generate profits. On some flights, China Southern also deployed the A380 on domestic flights, and I had the pleasure of reviewing one of these flights from Beijing to Guangzhou. The authentic China Southern service was world-class, but the sad part was that the cabins were not even half full. I recall on my flight, it only seemed like maybe 100 seats were filled, and mostly in Economy Class. How do you make profit out of that? Comments are closed.
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About Airline PRThis is a special section on Airline Branding, and Airline Public Relations written by me on all the flights I have been fortunate enough to have been on. These are not records taken from somewhere else, but are actual flights I have been on. Most of the flight trips are officially sponsored by the airline companies in order to promote their certain routes, and aircraft. Airline promotion and PR related work in the aviation industry is one of my expertise. Watch exclusive videos below taken in the cockpit of a Boeing 777-300ER in-flight over Chinese Airspace.
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