British Airways Airbus A380 Inaugural Service to Chicago - O'Hare / ORD [05.04.2018] 

Well...it's finally happened.13 years after the Airbus A380's maiden flight in Toulouse, France on April 27th, 2005 and its first commercial flight on October 25th, 2007 from Singapore to Sydney with Singapore Airlines, Chicago's very own O'Hare International Airport finally has regularly-scheduled A380 service...before today, only 2 A380's had ever been to O'Hare before:
Testbed airframe "world tour" flight 03.20.2007 - landed on RWY 4R
• A380 Chicago
&
• A380 landing at ORD 3/...
& an Emirates one-off flight on 07.19.2016 that also happened to be the first A380 revenue flight to ORD (with paying passengers aboard) - landed on RWY 10C
• INAUGURAL ORD Emirates...
British Airways ( ICAO : BAW / IATA : BA ) has officially become the first airline with scheduled Airbus A380 service to Chicago - O'Hare International Airport ( KORD / ORD ) from its main hub at London Heathrow Airport ( EGLL / LHR ), changing over the equipment on its evening flight, BAW297/296 from a Boeing 747-400 ( B744 ) to an A380-800 ( A388 )!
Their air traffic control callsign has also changed, from "Speedbird 297/296 Heavy" to "Speedbird 297/296 Super," both the Heavy and Super designations being verbal warnings to all aircraft in the vicinity to watch out for and possibly expect heavy wake turbulence behind and under the massive 4-engined aircraft.
Speedbird 297 Super landed on Runway 28-Center ( 2-8-Center / 28C ), overflying many North Side Chicago neighborhoods, where thousands upon thousands of people had gone outside their homes and jobs to watch it fly over thanks to major local news coverage of the event, both in anticipation of it and during and after the arrival. British Airways' ORD management team and the Chicago Department of Aviation were very kind in getting us out onto the airfield between runways to be right next to the A380'S arrival runway, close to its touchdown spot.
Gate M-11 is the only gate at ORD that can accommodate an A380. Back in 2016, over a few weeks, M-11 underwent multiple modifications including the addition of a 2nd jetbridge to reach the upper deck of the A380 as well as ramp modifications to accommodate the larger aircraft that meant the shifting of gates M-10 and M-9, WITHOUT the loss of widebody aircraft parking capabilities!
This arrival brought several hundred people out to O'Hare and the vicinity of the airport, from the usual gaggle of plane spotter friends of mine to airport employees on their days off work to the general public lined up against the airport perimeter fences who had heard about the well-publicized event through social media or the local TV and radio news, all who wanted to catch a glimpse of the gigantic widebody aircraft, a type which hadn't been seen at O'Hare since March 20th, 2007 and July 19th, 2016 when one of Airbus's test-beds visited the Windy City during its world tour and the latter, which was a one-off test run by Emirates to try out the modified M-11 Gate and jetways.
Aircraft G-XLEL Information:
Construction Number / cn / Manufacturer's Serial Number / MSN: 215
Aircraft Type: Airbus A380-841
First Flight: July 31st, 2014
Delivery Date: June 22nd, 2016 ( Ferried TLS - LHR 22 Jun 2016 on delivery )
Aiframe Age: 2.2 Years
Test registration: F-WWAL
Production Site: Toulouse (TLS)
Airframe Status: Active
Seating Configuration: F14C97W55Y303 ( 14 First Class Seats, 97 Business Class, 55 Premium Economy, & 303 Economy seats)
Powerplants: 4 Rolls-Royce RR Trent 900 high-bypass turbofan engines
Thanks for watching!
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joseg2143 Chicago O'Hare Int'l Airport Plane Spotting / Aircraft Spotting / Flight Tracking / Planespotting / Aircraft Photography
Recorded with a Canon PowerShot SX40HS on Friday, May 4th, 2018.

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