Blade Runner Airbus

BLadE runnEr

Airbus is at the forefront of the aviation industry, building worldclass commercial aircraft that capture more than half of all commercial airliner orders. It is also the world’s number one helicopter manufacturer. Philip Yorke takes a closer look at the company’s latest cutting-edge technology known as BLADE, an acronym for Breakthrough Laminar Aircraft Demonstrator. Industry Europe also reports on the company’s continuing investment in the world’s emerging markets and its strategy for future growth.

Airbus is a global leader in aeronautics, space and related services and is also a European leader in the provision of tanker, combat, transport and mission aircraft, as well as being one of the world’s leading space companies. Airbus has been responsible for the first viable, digital ‘fly-by-wire’ airliner, the Airbus A320, as well as delivering the world’s largest airliner, the Airbus A380. The company’s 10,000th aircraft, an A350, was recently delivered to Singapore Airlines.

To date, the global Airbus fleet has performed more than 110 million flights over 215 billion kilometres, carrying 12 billion customers. The company is a truly global operator with over 130 nationalities making up its 140,000 workforce.

Interestingly, by the year 2020, over 25 per cent of Airbus’s employers will be women, thus underlining the company’s commitment to a diverse and inclusive workforce. Airbus’s corporate headquarters are located in Toulouse, France. It is a component of the Euro Stoxx 50 stock market index. In 2016 Airbus recorded consolidated sales of more than €67 billion.

Focus on fuel reduction

Airbus has initiated its latest research in order to further reduce fuel consumption in airliners, thereby keeping the company and Europe at the forefront of environmentally friendly air transportation. Today’s milestone was the Airbus A340 Flight Lab’s first takeoff, equipped with outer wing sections designed for extremely smooth airflow over the surfaces. Known as Natural Laminar Flow, such a smooth passage of air creates less drag than the airflow over traditional wings and is capable of reducing fuel-burn by as much as 5 per cent.

Designated Project BLADE, this important research effort utilises the first ever A340 jetliner produced by Airbus, with its outboard wings replaced by approximately 10 metre-long laminar wing panels. These panels represent around two-thirds of the wing size on a short, or medium range airliner, for which laminar flow technology is deemed to be best suited.

The BLADE project is organised through Europe’s Clean Sky Aeronautical research programme. The project involves 21 European partners with over 500 contributors, including GKN Aerospace, designer of the starboard laminar wing panel, and Saab, designer of the port wing segment.

A team of 10 specially-trained pilots, test engineers and flight test engineers have been preparing for the A340 BLADE flight evaluations by spending time in a simulator and familiarising themselves with the mission equipment, which is the most technologically advanced to be installed on any Airbus flight test aircraft.

expanding global footprint

Recently, the first wide-body Completion & Delivery Centre (C&DC) to be established outside Europe was inaugurated in Tianjin, China and the very first European and Chinese-made Airbus A330 was subsequently delivered. The company has been taking additional steps in the expansion of its global footprint and strategic partnership with China. At the same time, the first Airbus A330 to be delivered from C&DC was handed over to Tianjin Airlines.

Located on the same site as the Airbus A320 Final Assembly Line and the Airbus Tainjin Delivery Centre, the A330 C&DC covers the aircraft completion activities including cabin installation, aircraft painting and production flight test, as well as customer flight acceptance and aircraft delivery. Some 150 Chinese staff members of the C&DC were trained by Airbus experts in Toulouse.

“The inauguration of our A330 C&DC in Tainjin, together with the first of many deliveries, marks a new milestone for Airbus’s interna-

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Thank you to Airbus and the aerospace community for our long-term respectful, trusting, professional and successful cooperation. tional footprint and underlines a strong spirit of cooperation with our Chinese partners,” said Fabrice Bregier, Airbus COO and president of Commercial Aircraft. “The wide body aircraft completed in China is an Airbus industry first, which demonstrates our mutual commitment to a strong and growing Chinese aviation sector.”

Today the Airbus wide-body aircraft is the most popular in China and is operated by nine airlines. The Airbus fleet with Chinese carriers included 1484 aircraft, of which 1282 are of the A320 family and 202 are of the A330 family. The A330 is one of the world’s most efficient and versatile wide-body aircraft with best-in-class operating economics. To date, the A330 family has attracted over 1700 orders and is the most cost-efficient and capable wide-body aircraft available on the market.

Showcasing a new digital platform

In recent months Airbus has taken full ownership of Malaysia’s Sepang Aircraft Engineering and expanded its capabilities. It has also established an MRO Alliance that includes Taiwan’s China Airlines and China’s GAMECO.

Airbus had a significant presence at the MRO Asia Pacific exhibition recently, along with its subsidiary Satair, each having a stand and speaking about the future of the maintenance sector at a related aviation conference. At the trade fair Airbus also showcased ‘Skywise’, its cloud-based digital platform which contains operational and technical data that airlines can access to make predictive and preventative maintenance decisions. Asian carriers such as Air Asia and Peach are among the first to launch the new digital facility.

For further details of the latest innovative commercial aircraft and specialised services and products from Airbus visit: www.airbus.com