Pretty sure that's a common theme for companies which end up on https://ourincrediblejourney.tumblr.com/
I managed to get the basics working in less than a day somewhere during mid december, but only ended up publishing it nine days ago. The meme was totally dead and the only actual function of the site was in teaching me to (hopefully) not make this mistake again!
In that time there was no absolutely necessary functionality I had added, it was all just polish, yet I wouldn't let myself make it public without adding it. I don't know how to stop doing this, but I feel like it's becoming a serious problem with anything I do.
No doubt: Without the drastic levels of regulation the FAA (and JAA) impose on civilian flight, fatalities would be orders of magnitude higher.
All 14 days of 2018? :)
Yep, blaming this typo on a severe undercaffeination.
> Politically speaking, we are living in dark times even if aviation is super safe.
The interesting question is: given the political climate (and especially the President's habit of "getting rid of rules"), how long will aviation stay super safe?
That last part is where Airbus may have missed the mark as design goals such as the A380's high floorspace to seat ratio were great decisions given its intended market (long haul flights, customers like space on long haul flights) also led to a less-than-optimal passengers per flight to operating cost per flight ratio in a market where hub to hub demand is declining. It also led to a low maximum takeoff weight for the size of its floorplan, making it useless as a freight/cargo aircraft, the one niche where the ancient 747 still reigns as king of the skies. A more robust design intended to hold more passengers would have also allowed it to carry more cargo which may have saved the program considering how expensive 747s are to operate.
... But somebody wanted to buy this product. Airbus expected the project to break even at ~300 sales and they have gotten 317 firm orders so far. People are massively overstating the commercial "failure" of this project. Even with their development troubles, Airbus is getting close to breaking even, if they can generate more sales over the next decade or so. (The break even point is estimated to be ~400 now.)
There are still firm orders for 5 years of production on the books. Early adopters are replacing their oldest planes with newly produced ones right now. ANA put in an entirely new, firm order two years ago despite not operating this type at all. Yes, no sale in 2 years is not great, but even Jan 2016 was long after everyone on the internet was calling for Airbus to kill the entire project already. If the 380 succeeds in ANA's fleet, there is scope for more orders from them or their close competitors.
Iran also has an agreement with Airbus that includes 12 380s, though that's not a firm order as far as I can tell. In addition to this, Emirates will probably have to order 50-100 new planes on top of their existing orders to replace their aging fleet in the near future. Emirates want an 380NEO, but they will probably have to accept the 380Plus that Airbus favors. Once they do, the 380 project will have the orders it needs to reach break even and to keep the production line open until a NEO makes sense. And if passenger numbers keep on increasing at 4-5% every year over the 10-15 years the 380 is likely to stay in production, the market Airbus had expected/hoped for originally might very well materialize.