On May 13, 2020, Lufthansa (LHAB) (LHA) is sending its seventh ‒ and the last ‒ Airbus A380 to a storage facility in Teruel, Spain.
The last A380-800 aircraft to leave Lufthansa’s (LHAB) (LHA) fleet is a ten years’ old München (registration number D-AIMB). The aircraft is named in the airline’s tradition to give its superjumbos the names of major cities.
The double-decker took off for the 2 hours-long flight LH9924 from Lufthansa’s (LHAB) (LHA) hub in Frankfurt Airport (FRA). At 8:30 (UTC), the aircraft landed in a storage facility in Teruel, Spain (TEV), where it would stay parked for an undisclosed amount of time.
Good-bye, for now, good boy. Our “Mike-Bravo“ is the 7th and last A380 to be temporarily parked in Teruel. To those who want to follow him @flightradar24 check out LH9924, departure 8:00 LT @Airport_FRA. Have you spotted him? #planespotting #WeAreInThisTogether pic.twitter.com/rxtp7oOp4p
— Lufthansa News (@lufthansaNews) May 13, 2020
Prior to the COVID-19 crisis and almost complete stoppage of international air travel, the German airline operated 14 Airbus A380 aircraft. As the pandemic developed, Lufthansa (LHAB) (LHA) revised its fleet, making a decision to accelerate the retirement of six of its A380s ‒ the aircraft were previously scheduled to be sold back to Airbus in 2022.
The German airline began relocating the remaining seven superjumbos from two main German hubs, namely Frankfurt Airport (FRA) and Munich Airport (MUC), to the Teruel facility for temporary storage in April 2020. The first aircraft, registered D-AIMG, flew in from Munich Airport (MUC) on April 28.
One aircraft, however, is facing a different fate than other A380s. In early May 2020, Lufthansa Technik revealed that it was working to convert the passenger aircraft into a temporary cargo plane.
Teruel Airport is home to Tarmac Aerosave, a company that specializes in aircraft maintenance processes and is one of the few companies that are certified to work on the Airbus A380 double-decker