A Clean Sheet Widebody: The Story Of The Airbus A350

Video from the channel Long Haul by Simple Flying about Airbus A350, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 11:59. Language: English. Video type: Documentary.

The story of the Airbus A350 as an entirely new design: its origin, production, versions and commercial reception.

Airbus was preparing a successor to the A330 with new engines and partial carbon-fibre construction. The early success of the Boeing 787, launched in 2004, forced a rethink. At the 2006 Farnborough Airshow it announced the A350XWB, with three planned versions (-800, -900 and -1000), a composite fuselage and wing, and entry into service planned for 2013. General Electric offered the GEnx, but without a higher-thrust option for the -1000, and the Rolls-Royce Trent XWB ended up as the engine for all versions. Production is spread across Europe: wings in Broughton, fuselage and tail sections in Puerto Real and Getafe, nose section in Saint-Nazaire, and rear fuselage in Hamburg. Final assembly takes place in Toulouse.

The A350-800, for 276 passengers, reached 182 orders by mid-2008. The launch of the A330neo at Farnborough in 2014 took its place and Airbus cancelled it. The A350-900 entered service with Qatar Airways in January 2015. By March 2021 the programme had 913 orders, 745 for the -900 and 168 for the -1000. Qatar Airways is the largest customer, with 76 aircraft, followed by Singapore Airlines. The latter operates the A350-900ULR, with 67 business-class seats and 94 premium economy seats, on the Singapore–New York route. In the United States, only Delta operated it. Possible future developments mentioned include an A350neo and a freighter version.