On Friday (today), Global Airlines acquired full ownership of its first aircraft, an Airbus A380, with MSN 120, and registered it in Malta, aviation news portal, Simple Flying has revealed.
Global Airlines was founded in 2021 by travel personality and airline CEO James Asquith. The UK-based airline aims to launch operations at some point in 2024 with routes operating between London Gatwick, New York JFK and Los Angeles International Airport.
Commenting on the acquisition, Mr Asquith said that "lots of people" thought that the airline wouldn’t make it this far.
“I couldn’t be happier to be giving MSN 120 a second lease of life. Purchasing an aircraft takes a phenomenal amount of time, and over the past year, we, with support from partners, have been putting the building blocks in place to take full ownership of the aircraft and plan its first flight,” he said.
Global Airline’s plan to solely operate using A380s was criticised and fuelled with scepticism because of the high operational costs and challenges of identifying markets that would attract a volume of passengers to consistently occupy seats.
The Airbus A380 is said to be the largest commercial passenger aircraft with a capacity that reaches between 500 and 853 passengers. Global Airline’s plans are to include economy, business-class and first-class cabins. Today, the majority of A380s are operated by Emirates.
Global Airlines had agreed to acquire four A380 aircraft and later signed an agreement with Hi Fly to work together on the development and maintenance of the aircraft acquired.
The aircraft was originally a China Southern Airbus A380 that was flown out to the Mojave Desert in late 2022. Despite uncertainty whether it would fly again, the aircraft flew again on 21st December 2022.
Following this, the aircraft’s registration was changed to the US N-register, where it was designated as N123KK.
However, recent data from the Federal Aviation Administration (DAA) indicated that the aircraft was deregistered on Thursday (yesterday) to be exported to Malta.
Today, the Transport Malta Civil Aviation Directorate issued a registration certificate for the aircraft, indicating that Global Airlines is the new owner and Hi Fly is now the aircraft’s registrant.
Simple Flying reported that according to the airline, work has already started to restore the quadjet to a condition suitable for flight. The aircraft’s essential fluids such as hydraulics and oil, have already been replaced. Business Class Aviation, as per Airbus instructions, is currently conducting thorough testing of all systems to ensure they meet the standards typically applied to new aircraft.
Additionally, all tests, including a near-full-thrust engine run have been deemed successful and the aircraft is reported to be in excellent condition.
Despite the fact that the airline will keep the China Southern seats, it will undergo a complete cabin refurbishment.
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