Air Force One Replacement?

It appears that the US military are looking at the possibility of changing the Presidents plane for an Airbus A380 !
These things are huge,they build the wings not far from where I live in North Wales,and they needed a special plane called the Beluga just to transport the wings to France,where they gaffer tape them onto the fuselage or something.



Heres the Beluga page on Wiki:

en.wikipedia.org...

And heres the article about the possibility of A380 as a replacement for current Air Force One:

blog.wired.com...

from the article:

"The Airbus A380 jumbo jet is billions over budget and years behind schedule. Which, I suppose, makes it a perfect fit for the Defense Department. The U.S. military is looking at the A380 as a possible replacement for Air Force One and the C-5 cargo plane, Stephen Trimble reports for Flight International. "

The A380 is just gigantic,so although it may be a bigger target in the air,it sure has the space for some sophisticated counter measures..with room to spare.

I wonder what Boeing will be thinking about this...I imagine they are slightly cheesed off.

Good find - but I would be surprised if the U.S. Air Force chose the A380. It just wouldn't look 'good' to have the president of the U.S. flying around in a foreign made aircraft.

No - I'd bet that they are going to go with the Boeing747-8

As for the C-5 - yeah, I could see them taking the A380 for the 'new' C-5. Like you said, the A380 is BIG!

I agree DC,
Plus the size of the thing may limit where the President can land,which is probably one major concern I would think.
There is talk of airports having to re design parts of runways to accommodate the A380.

Originally posted by Silcone Synapse
Plus the size of the thing may limit where the President can land,which is probably one major concern I would think.

Another excellent and very valid point. There are a lot more airports that can handle the 747 than the 380.

And many airports may not even make the necessary changes that would allow the 380 to take off and land, at least not at MTOW.