It’s a big day for Emirates as the Dubai based carrier takes delivery of its first Airbus A350! The plane, an A350-900 registered as A6-EXA, is the first of 65 A350 aircraft to be delivered to the airline over the course of the next few years.
Until today, Emirates exclusively operated Airbus A380 and Boeing 777 aircraft. The introduction of the Airbus A350 is the first new aircraft type for the airline since 2008. Emirates has quite a few new aircraft on order and Boeing 787s and (hopefully) Boeing 777Xs will be joining the fleet soon.
The new aircraft was handed over to Emirates during a ceremony at the Airbus factory in Toulouse and is currently en route to Dubai International Airport (DXB). The plane will spend the next few weeks operating familiarization flights before entering revenue service. Emirates will deploy the A350 on flights to Edinburgh (EDI) beginning January 15th.
After Edinburgh, Emirates plans to deploy the A350 on routes to Bahrain (BAH), Kuwait City (KWI), Muscat (MCT), Mumbai (BOM), Ahmedabad (AMD), Colombo (CMB), Lyon (LYS), and Bologna (BLQ) from its Dubai hub.
While details on the hard-product aren’t widely known, Emirates recently introduced retrofitted cabins for its Boeing 777 fleet and I would assume the A350 would feature a similar product for consistency’s sake.
Summary
Emirates has taken delivery of its first Airbus A350. The aircraft, A6-EXA, is the first of 65 Airbus A350-900s to be delivered to the Dubai based carrier. Familiarization flights are expected to take place over the coming weeks before the carrier introduces the new aircraft type on flights between Dubai and Edinburgh.
(Images courtesy Emirates)