Surprisingly The German government decided to get 3 A350 to replace the 2 A340-300s.



https://simpleflying.com/german-airforce-a350/

Merkel reacted low profile and mild during the high profile G20 technical / organisational failure. But apparently everybody is so ill about this and other embarrassing malfunctions, they are ready to put Billion on the table

I had thought throwing some money and people on the A340's would have done the job. They are not ETOPS, have the range, space, are quiet..

Airbus helped getting some A350's quickly (sold out for 6 yrs officially) & LHT will put in VIP interiors. Doubts were about the A338NEO (cheaper, fitting the bill), but the bigger high tech A350 in the end got the deal. Functionality is only the starting point for these kind of purchasers. https://youtu.be/Bynrl5lQOmc?t=65

Artist are free to (unasked for) design a suitable livery symbolizing Germany's new, still sober, self confidence.
This is tax money, so better give the public some good value.

They better ask Airbus for a towbar installation option and a spares trailer?
Flugbereitschaft has availability issues across the board.
Minister Heiko Maas coudn't use the A319 to get back from Mali.

Together with the Gorch Fock Bark restauration affair I get the impression that
The Bundeswehr is in the process of doing a "tar and feather" operation to their boss.
Next thing they are going to sabotage her 3 Wetter Taft.

According to the article, the first A350 will be delivered „later this year“. So how can this even work? I still think they might acquire a former prototype.

N14AZ wrote:

According to the article, the first A350 will be delivered „later this year“. So how can this even work? I still think they might acquire a former prototype.

Rumors say that another airline (not LH though) gave up a delivery slot.
Picking up a former prototype now and new ones off the line later will probably bring up the same problems of missing commonality that they wanted to avoid in the first place.

The wiring will be fun. Prototype, brought to LH airline configuration, VIP on top, military comms and bundeswehr features plus US installed "secret" countermeasures.

And then you take those planes and let them park for weeks in the rain and then go to some high profile mission to where there is no station, spare part or hangar available with long standbye times and immediate departure whenever needed. All with the press on board to report even the tiniest squawk online.

According to a tweet from aviation journalist Andreas Spaeth the Luftwaffe might take over an A350 delivery slot from Air Mauritius.

German website spiegelonline.de reports the 3 aircraft alone will cost about 640m euros. Plus 288m for VIP cabin and 229m for LAIRCM

The first A359 will be ready in June 2020, as some "unexpected short term possibilities" for delivery slots have opened up at Airbus' A350 production: https://www.aero.de/news-31410/Bund-mac ... epfen.html

Luftwaffe confirms: three A350-900s will arrive by mid-2020. Interesting to see which delivery slots.

https://twitter.com/Team_Luftwaffe/stat ... 1056142337

Is this is so they can claim they are upping their defence spending?!


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giblets wrote:

Is this is so they can claim they are upping their defence spending?!


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No need to “claim” that. It’s a fact that Germany has increased defense spending every year since 2015 and yep, this will be part of the math though it won’t make much of a difference. My advise is actually to add police costs to the calculation and boom, Germany is above 2%. Other NATO countries are doing it so why shouldn’t we?

Also, since we’re talking about burden sharing, it’s time for other countries to start paying their fair share in taking in more war refugees.

giblets wrote:

Is this is so they can claim they are upping their defence spending?!

No.
Pi**sing away money on the Gorch Fock restauration project was supposed to achieve that.

These can't be there soon enough.

BERLIN - A German Federal Government Bombardier Global 5000 paralyzed Berlin Schönefeld on Tuesday morning. The broken aircraft blocked the runway, after which various scheduled flights had to divert to neighboring airports.

The Global 5000 had returned to Schönefeld due to a technical defect, but hit the ground with both wings on landing. The cause of this is still being investigated. There were no passengers on board, the crew was medically examined after the incident.

https://www.luchtvaartnieuws.nl/nieuws/ ... haven-plat

Dutchy wrote:

These can't be there soon enough.

Not really relevant, is it? The aircraft had a hard landing and suffered damage. The Globals are new (delivered in 2011), ordered as replacements for the ageing and problematic Challengers.

This could happen to a brand new A350 as well.

VSMUT wrote:

Dutchy wrote:

These can't be there soon enough.

Not really relevant, is it? The aircraft had a hard landing and suffered damage. The Globals are new (delivered in 2011), ordered as replacements for the ageing and problematic Challengers.

This could happen to a brand new A350 as well.

This is relevant. The aircraft did not just have a hard landing. It experienced severe controllability issues soon after take off and the pilots had to land immediately. There are pictures online of the plane banking hard few meters above the runway while the pilots tried to bring it down safely. It is relevant to the overall thread because it seems the accident has been caused by maintenance issues. The plane had just been returned after some scheduled maintenance work.
They can buy as many new planes as they want but it they don´t fix their procedures and qualitiy controls, this kind of problems will keep on happening.
It certainly does not inspire much confidence in the Luftwaffe.

It was not maintained by the Luftwaffe but by a commercial service provider certified for the type and based at SXF. Without being able to go into more details.

According to posts #532 and #550 from the A350 P&D thread in CivAv.....

hkcanadaexpat wrote:

EduardoL wrote:

Fist A350 ACJ
msn/427 German Air Force
msn/443 Private Unknown

I show 443 as the first ACJ. To become D-AKAY for the German Government.

hkcanadaexpat wrote:

Updates from the April O&D:
- 3x A359s added to Private Jets order book (German Government)

steman wrote:

VSMUT wrote:

Dutchy wrote:

These can't be there soon enough.

Not really relevant, is it? The aircraft had a hard landing and suffered damage. The Globals are new (delivered in 2011), ordered as replacements for the ageing and problematic Challengers.

This could happen to a brand new A350 as well.

This is relevant. The aircraft did not just have a hard landing. It experienced severe controllability issues soon after take off and the pilots had to land immediately. There are pictures online of the plane banking hard few meters above the runway while the pilots tried to bring it down safely. It is relevant to the overall thread because it seems the accident has been caused by maintenance issues. The plane had just been returned after some scheduled maintenance work.
They can buy as many new planes as they want but it they don´t fix their procedures and qualitiy controls, this kind of problems will keep on happening.
It certainly does not inspire much confidence in the Luftwaffe.

For your information. The Global5000 is totally damaged and has been now written off. The wings and landing gear got to much damage.

And Bomardier, responsible for the maintenance of the jet (and failed to build in a replacement part correctly) are fully responsible, and it seems they will have to pay the writtem off.
https://www.n-tv.de/politik/Kanzlerjet-wird-mit-Totalschaden-verschrottet-article21249272.html

Next to the A350s, the German government had ordered three jets, the first Global6000 will be delivered next week.

Any news here? The first A/C should be in FAL already

It's out of FAL, unpainted and tail flag covered

https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1437951#p21937567

First flight yesterday:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aircrafts/49566341212/

Despite COVID19, the first aircraft (reg 10+03) was sent back to TLS in full livery today: https://aeronewsglobal.com/video-german ... ll-livery/

The cheatline looks ... odd ... with the A350's low nose and racoon mask.

mxaxai wrote:

Despite COVID19, the first aircraft (reg 10+03) was sent back to TLS in full livery today: https://aeronewsglobal.com/video-german ... ll-livery/

The cheatline looks ... odd ... with the A350's low nose and racoon mask.

This is Germany! Design is not an issue, its got to be just efficent.

LH's A350 D-AIXI has been doing training flights around Germany today. https://www.flightradar24.com/data/aircraft/d-aixi
Flight training for Luftwaffe pilots, I was told. Take it with a grain of salt but it would make sense...

redcap1962 wrote:

mxaxai wrote:

Despite COVID19, the first aircraft (reg 10+03) was sent back to TLS in full livery today: https://aeronewsglobal.com/video-german ... ll-livery/

The cheatline looks ... odd ... with the A350's low nose and racoon mask.

This is Germany! Design is not an issue, its got to be just efficent.

I wouldn't say so. The design looked good on the A340 and others. It's just that they didn't consider the specific nose design of the A350. Maybe in this case, it was more important to speed up the procurement. I still hope that the colour scheme at the front end will be reworked. It would already look better if the narrow white space between the cockpit windows and the stripes was black.

The first A350ACJ is now Delivered to Lufthansa Technik and arrived in Hamburg today - https://aibfamily.flights/A350/416

Nice photo...maybe Frau Merkel would have a chance to use it longer before her term as Chancellor ends.....

https://www.flightglobal.com/air-transp ... 78.article

The first A350 has been handed over to the German government today. First government use is expected later this year, following crew training.

The cabin is equipped with ...

... a conference room, a lounge, more comfortable seats, more bathrooms and a modern kitchen

https://www.ndr.de/nachrichten/hamburg/ ... s1676.html [German]

I love Flightglobal's description of the plane's role.....

"Germany’s government has unveiled the first of three Airbus A350-900s which have been configured for the special air missing wing of the ministry of defence."

https://www.flightglobal.com/first-germ ... 38.article


Hopefully, it wouldn't go tech on them anymore.

Baptism and handover of the second aircraft by LH Technik in Hamburg.


https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FhskhdGWQAA ... name=large


https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Fhskhd5X0AE ... name=large

Here an article in German about the second A350 for the Government:
https://www.aero.de/news-43926/Olaf-Scholz-jettet-bald-mit-Konrad-Adenauer-um-die-Welt.html
This aircraft is named after the first chancellor of FRG from 1949 to 1963, Konrad Adenauer.

I just wonder why we need three such aircraft?

Devilfish wrote:

Hopefully, it wouldn't go tech on them anymore.

I never understood why these government A340-300s performed so poorly. Their sister ships continue to fly for LH in regular service and don't show any signs of fatigue.