After three-thirty years

What future for Airbus’s metal widebody twin?

Designed through the early 1980s and revealed in 1986 alongside its sister, the A340, Airbus’ enduring A330 widebody twinjet was never supposed to be the linchpin of the Airbus A330/340 family.

Created as a largely regional, high-capacity airliner to replace the A300 (and to an extent the A310) and expand on its missions, it was introduced into services the year after the four-engined A340, and designed in the context of extended range operations at the time being limited to just ETOPS-120 at entry-into-service, achieving ETOPS-180 after a year of service. How things change: the A350 was granted ETOPS-370 in 2014 prior to EIS.