Among other stories he told me that the A380 is one of best balanced planes out there, and apparently a joy to fly. He said even without engines he could easily land it like a glider.
Now, I can't really verify what he said, but he seemed sincere.
Having travelled in the A380 as passenger, I will sure miss it.
Apparently Airbus was planning to make a larger variant as well, and the wing was designed to accommodate that. But the -800 was years delayed and struggled to find customers, the larger variant was never made.
Also the quietest plane I've ever been on.
Sad place for civilisation to lose this machine.
Most airplanes are designed to glide down and be able to land in the event of loss of all power from all existing engines, subject to the available altitude above ground (the potential height energy from the fall is used as the source of kinetic energy for keeping airspeed+lift) and distance to a suitable for landing piece of land.
He just specifically called out the A380 for being exquisitely balanced.
There were many more interesting stories including some (controlled) crashes and an uncontrolled crash when they tried the planes under extreme conditions.
He actually felt sorry for "normal" pilots, since they do not really get to try out the planes :)
Anyway...
Airliner design is regulated for stability for passenger flight on IFR approaches. So they're all pretty smooth.
(The reason for the 737 MAX MCAS system was to meet those requirements, although they failed in that case.)
All planes can glide if the wings are attached, and any essential electricity is available for control (if necessary.)
A corollary of "all planes glide" is that planes cannot really fall or dive straight (vertically) down from an appreciable height with the wings attached. A good story to tell passengers afraid of flying.
A purpose built glider has a glide ratio of about 60:1, so it could travel 60mi while only losing 1mi of altitude, while a Cessna 172 has a glide ratio of 9. Large passenger aircraft have glide ratios inbetween, with a 737 having a ratio of 17.
On the other extreme end you have military fighter planes, which tend to more closely resemble well propelled un-aerodynamic objects once their engines give out. The worst I could find was the F104 Starfighter, which has a glide ratio of 3-5 depending on its exact configuration. Dead stick landings of these aircraft tend to be rare, as the availability of ejection seats (especially before zero-zero seats became a thing) encourages a not-my-problem-any-more attitude among pilots who discover themselves absent a working engine.
Which made this all the more impressive:
https://theaviationist.com/2014/09/15/f-15-lands-with-one-wi...
With sufficient thrust pigs fly just fine
And assuming the wings haven’t lost their lift due to ice: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Eagle_Flight_4184
Planes can glide, but there’s still lots of ways to drive one straight into the ground.