The superjumbo returns! Snapshot of British Airways A380 in Club World
After 18 months the British Airways Airbus A380 is BACK in service…but I hadn’t planned on flying on the unimaginably huge superjumbo. When I booked our trip to Madrid we was due to return on the #humble A320 aircraft - the usual one that plies the skies in and around Europe for short haul. Unexpectedly, BA announced the reintroduction of the A380 into their fleet due to the restart of US-Europe travel although there was just one small problem…these crews needed retraining on working the A380 again. Their solution? Putting the large plane on two routes, once per day returning to Heathrow from Madrid and Frankfurt. This is a big step up from the regular planes and an aircraft change I happily accepted.
Our journey began at the impressive but simultaneously ugly Madrid-Barajas Airport - home of British Airways’ sister airline Iberia.
I booked this flight in Economy, however was surprised at the gate that my boarding pass wouldn’t scan…because I was upgraded for free to BA’s business class - Club Europe.
Cabin ambience upon boarding was lovely with colourful mood lighting - although it was awfully dark for boarding!
The A380 features the older BA business class with 8 seats across. This is quite a dense arrangement but provides ample comfort particularly on this short flight.
The seat should recline into bed mode…however my seat did not seem to be working on this journey.
A flip out stool provides some space to stretch your legs out and with no obstruction above making it easy to get comfy without hitting them on a shelf like on other aircraft.
When the divider is up and you are sat at the window seat, it can actually feel very private on-board - it’s just a tad awkward when you’re staring at a complete stranger when it goes down.
The entertainment system is dated with the worst resistive touchscreen I’ve used in a very long time - these sorely need updating to a better display and touch input. On this aircraft, I would recommend using the remote control instead.
Content selection was actually quite decent though and I was surprised to see an interactive moving map on an entertainment system this bad.
The toilets on the downstairs of the aircraft are not the biggest but there would be enough room to get changed into comfortable clothes on a long haul flight. It also features The White Company moisturiser and soap as per almost all British Airways flights.
Storage on the seat is limited to just a drawer by your feet - this means you’ll have to put most of your luggage in the overhead locker for takeoff and landing.
The are plentiful ports at the seat - including a multi-type power outlet (including UK), old-school composite video input and 2 very slow charging USB ports.
Considering I was told that I would receive no food on-board, due to the free gate upgrade, my expectations were exceeded with a basic pasta dish and a nice cheesecake. Nothing to get excited about but enough for this short 1h50 hop from Madrid to London.
Although not perfect, this flight was unexpectedly good for a journey of this length but the British Airways A380 is clearly beginning to show its age - especially with the seat design and inflight entertainment. The retrofit with the Club Suite, due to complete by 2025, can’t come soon enough and will make the experience on their superjumbo even better. In the meantime, I would only take this on the shorter long haul routes on their network or look for aircraft like the A350 which have a superior cabin experience. NGL - I still found this quite exciting and a double decker plane never gets old…the last time I flew on an A380 was to and from South Africa nine years ago.
