Aircraft

By Guy Norris at Farnborough air show

Capacity of 747-8I moves closer to rival Airbus A380

Boeing could reposition its 747-8 Intercontinental to bring the four-engined long-range widebody's passenger capacity to within 10% of the Airbus A380's standard three-class 555-seat capacity.

Initial studies of the stretched Boeing 747-8 Intercontinental appear to show the aircraft could seat almost 500 passengers and still make its provisional 14,800km (8,000nm) minimum range target, says the manufacturer.

The findings, which are yet to be ratified during ongoing trade studies, could satisfy the additional payload needs of several potential customers and for the first time put the 747-8 in a similar capacity bracket to the A380.

Boeing 747 sales, marketing and in-service support vice-president Randy Tinseth says rough calculations indicate that with a 5.6m (18.3ft) stretch, as opposed to the initially planned 3.6m fuselage extension, the aircraft could accommodate "around 10 extra business class or 30-34 additional economy seats and still get 8,000nm". Together with the provision for the upper lobe galley, which frees up an extra 12 seats on the main deck, this would potentially raise maximum seating capacity under Boeing tri-class rules to around 496, compared with the originally envisaged 450.

The exact definition is being determined during talks with around 25 customers of which "15 say the range and capacity is fine, one set say they need more range and one set say they need more seats. We're working in a trade space and that's pretty narrow, for example two or three rows is equal to around 200nm range. But it's critical to us that we maintain 8,000nm range," says Tinseth.

"The good thing is that six months ago, before we launched the -8F, we weren't having those discussions and once we launched we got their attention," says Tinseth, who acknowledges "these are probably discussions we should have been having a year ago". Boeing expects to complete configuration studies around March-April 2007, and is offering the aircraft for service entry in 2010.