A380: Safety Evac Video Released (and more)

News from the aviation trenches.

On 26 March of 2006, Airbus conducted a full-scale evacuation test on the A380 in Hamburg, Germany, with a full staff of flight attendants, pilots, and a large number of passengers. For the first time the video footage of that test was released, and it shows that the A380 can fully evacuate all the people onboard with only half of its escape slides working, in complete darkness, in less than 90 seconds (in this case, they completed the test in 78 seconds with 853 passengers and 18 cabin crew members).

A380 Evacuation Test, narration in German

There are two articles from FlightGlobal detailing the process, and it will give you an idea just how specifics the requirements are just to run the tests as close to real life situation as possible.

Report link here. First hand account from one of the test passengers link here.

Delta is out!

As in bankruptcy!!! Finally, one of the largest airlines in the world is out of Chapter 11, and will start trading publically under DAL on 3 May 2007. Good job, Delta, looking forward to seeing your fleet in the new Delta livery!