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The Airbus A330 is a large-capacity medium-to-long-range commercial passenger airplane manufactured by Airbus Industrie. It was developed at the same time as the four-engined A340.
Airbus intended the A330 to compete directly in the ETOPS (Extended Twin-engine Operations) market, which was effectively established by the Boeing 767. The Boeing 777 also belongs to this class; the Boeing 757 shares a heritage with the 767 but lacks the range, and is not wide-bodied.
The A330's fuselage and wings are virtually identical to the A340's, although it has different engines. The A330 fuselage design is inherited from the Airbus A300 and the fly-by-wire system and flightdeck from the Airbus A320.
There are two variants of the A330: the long fuselage A330-300 measures 63.6 m (208 ft 1 in) in length and can fly up to 10,500 km (5,650 nautical miles). The short fuselage A330-200 measures 59.0 m (193 ft 7 in) in length with an operating range of 12,500 km (6,750 nautical miles).
The A330-200 was developed in part to replace the A300-600R and to compete with the 767-300ER.The A330-200 is a shortened version of the original -300.
Its vertical fin is taller compared to -300 to restore its effectivity due to the fuselage shrink. It has additional fuel capacity and has an MTOW of 275 tonnes. Typical range with 253 passengers in a three-class configuration is 12,500 km (6,750 nautical miles).
Power is provided by two General Electric CF6-80E, Pratt & Whitney PW4000 or Rolls-Royce Trent 700 engines. All engines are ETOPS-180 min rated. First customer deliveries,to ILFC/Canada 3000, were in April 1998.
The A330-200 has sold strongly since its launch and has virtually eliminated the Boeing 767 from the marketplace. As a result, Boeing has asked both Rolls RoyceRolls-Royce plc is the second-largest aircraft engine maker in the world, behind General Electric's GE Aircraft Engines division. Rolls-Royce, an automobile company founded in 1906 by Henry Royce and C. Rolls, produced its first aircraft engine in 1914. and GE to design engines that enable the 7E7 Dreamliner to be 15 % more economical than the A330-200.
The direct Boeing equivalents are the 767-400ER and 7E7The Boeing 7E7 or Dreamliner is a mid-sized passenger airliner currently under development by Boeing Commercial Airplanes (BCA) and scheduled to enter service in 2008. It will carry between 200 and 350 passengers depending on the seating configuration, an.
Operators of the A330-200 include Aer LingusAer Lingus ( IATA designator EI is the national airline of Ireland and one of the most easily recognised airlines in the world thanks to its distinctive logo and livery. Based in Dublin, Ireland it operates over 30 aircraft serving Europe and the United S, Air FranceBoeing 747 Air France (AFR, Compagnie Nationale Air France is the national airline of France. The company transported 43. 3 million passengers and earned 12. 53 billion Euro in revenues between April 2001 and March 2002. It has routes to 296 cities in 85, Air TransatAir Transat is a Canadian charter airline. One of the top 10 integrated tourism companies, Air Transat was founded by former Quebecair employees in 1987 as an off-shoot of Trafic Voyages. It made its inaugural flight on November 14, 1987, travelling from, Austrian Airlines, Emirates, EVA Air, Gulf Air, LTU, Lufthansa, Qantas, Qatar Airways, Swiss International Air Lines, and TAM.