Have you ever wondered what the codes in an airplane name mean? Also do you know why is it “A 3” in the beginning of Airbus ?
(Credit to Pinterest, a2zblog.in)
Although it may seem like the letters and numbers assigned to aircraft are completely arbitrary, there is actually a fine-tuned system behind the naming.
The History-“A 3”
After 15 days the Airbus will celebrate its 52nd Anniversary. Exactly 52 years ago the story of a European multinational company started, when France and West Germany signed a document, affirming their commitment to the A300 program. The company officially took off on the 29th of May, 1969.
- The very first airplane made was the A300.
- The “A” stood for Airbus
- 300 was the original passenger capacity.
- After some time, they realized that the plane would be better with only 260 passengers (instead of 300).
- However, rather than rename the plane the A260, they decided to go with A300B.
(Courtesy to airbus.com and a2zblog.in)
The beginning of Airbus “A 3” !!
Airbus had a simple reason why they named their first jet the A300 – it carried 300 passengers. The A stands for Airbus!
Anyways, the manufacturer presented the A300B1 with the following specifications:
- 300 passengers
- 2 General Electric (GE) CF6-50A high-bypass turbofan engines
After that, Airbus decided to continue with their system and started naming their planes by multiples of 10 — A310, A320, A330, A340, A350 and A380.
Why Airbus skipped A360 and A370 ?
It could be because of the sheer size of the A380.
Due to the fact that it is that much bigger than the A350, it still has the option to build aircraft between the A350 and the A380 in regards to their size and passenger capacity. It‘s no secret that eventually the company will have to introduce new aircraft to replace their A320 or A330s, even if they are fairly new because of the neo (new engine option) upgrade.
OR
In case they ever wanted to go back and create planes that are somewhere in between the A350 and the A380 in terms of size.
(Credit to airbus.com | a2zblog.in)
Note:
When the Airline decides to tweak a plane just a bit, they will stick to numbers close by. For example, the shorter variants of the A320, A318, and A319.
But these four letters and numbers are only part of the aircraft’s name.
- A full, proper name would be, for example, the Airbus A320-231.
- This plane belongs to the A320 family, and the last three digits specify the plane even more.
- The first digit means that it was part of the Airbus A320-200 series, the second version of this plane.
- The last digits correspond to the type of engine used.
Do you know about several deaths of Airbus officials due to Covid? Click to know!
https://a2zblog.in/air-india-pilot-and-maintenance-engineer-succumbs-to-covid/
