Less than a week before its official entry in service, Malaysia Airlines showed in Toulouse its first aircraft with its new livery.
TOULOUSE- The first A380 for Malaysia Airlines was unveiled today bearing its special celebration livery, ahead of entry-into-service this Sunday (1 July 2012) on the Kuala Lumpur-London route. The livery was designed by Malaysia Airlines specifically for its new A380 flagship and was applied post-delivery by Airbus in Toulouse.
Altogether Malaysia Airlines has ordered six A380s with a premium layout seating 494 passengers in three classes. The arriving aircraft will be used to operate thrice weekly (Tuesday, Friday, Sunday) for Kuala Lumpur – London and the return flight departing the next day.
The current overall booked load for the first seven A380 flights is very encouraging, with departures from Kuala Lumpur and London registering 89% and 87% seat factors respectively. In particular, the first five flights out of Kuala Lumpur are fully booked for First class. The demand for Business class, which has a capacity of 64 seats per flight, is also very encouraging with one flight overbooked from London and another fully booked from Kuala Lumpur. Overall, the booked Business class load for the first seven flights in each direction is around 85% from Kuala Lumpur and 90% from London.
By August 2012, with the delivery of the second aircraft, Malaysia Airlines will operate daily A380 flights on this route.
Luc Citrinot a French national is a freelance journalist and consultant in tourism and air transport with over 20 years experience. Based in Paris and Bangkok, he works for various travel and air transport trade publications in Europe and Asia.
