Airbus Beluga
en.wikipedia.org
Airbus Beluga
1–10 of 59 posts
Re: Airbus Beluga
#2I saw this plane once in person, no picture will ever do it justice. That something that size can fly at all without being a dirigible is absolutely amazing.
Re: Airbus Beluga
#3The 100K lb capacity is interesting. An 18 wheeler truck has 80K lb capacity, I would have thought it could carry multiple full capacity containers.
Re: Airbus Beluga
#4Living near Hamburg, Germany and working in the city (pre Covid) I saw it quite often when it approached for landing at the Airbus facility.
Compared to all other air traffic going to the regular airport it definitely looks quite interesting, when in flight. I actually enjoy seeing it as something of engineering ingenuity.
When my SO and me bought our house the seller was working at Airbus and told me that he found it pleasant to fly in as a passenger when he needed to visit the French facility for work.
Re: Airbus Beluga
#5Does anyone know what kind of payloads this plane is used for? Something relatively light but requiring a large volume?
As there are only 5 of those built, there doesn’t seem to be a big demand for these, and the payload capacity is the same as the standard body version.
Re: Airbus Beluga
#6Does anyone know what kind of payloads this plane is used for? Something relatively light but requiring a large volume? As there are only 5 of those built, there doesn’t seem to be a big demand for these, and the payload capacity is the same as the standard body version.
The linked article goes into quite a bit of detail on why these planes were developed and what they’re used for.
Re: Airbus Beluga
#7Does anyone know what kind of payloads this plane is used for? Something relatively light but requiring a large volume? As there are only 5 of those built, there doesn’t seem to be a big demand for these, and the payload capacity is the same as the standard body version.
article said
Re: Airbus Beluga
#8Does anyone know what kind of payloads this plane is used for? Something relatively light but requiring a large volume? As there are only 5 of those built, there doesn’t seem to be a big demand for these, and the payload capacity is the same as the standard body version.
Aircraft parts such as wings etc. Airbus facilites are split across several countries, so it's simpler to move oversize parts like this.
Re: Airbus Beluga
#9The 100K lb capacity is interesting. An 18 wheeler truck has 80K lb capacity, I would have thought it could carry multiple full capacity containers.
That you can fit something inside a plane doesn't mean the plane will be able to lift off the ground.
Beluga is meant to carry oversize cargo, but not overweight cargo -- it's based on an Airbus A300 with a roughly 100k lb cargo capacity, but with a huge fuselage. Same wings, and worse aerodynamics.
Re: Airbus Beluga
#10The 100K lb capacity is interesting. An 18 wheeler truck has 80K lb capacity, I would have thought it could carry multiple full capacity containers.
Yes, but even an 18 wheeler truck could not load a container full of steel.
Max weight and max size are upper limits, reach one and the other no longer matters.