Qatar Airways came hair-raisingly close to eliminating the Airbus A380 from its fleet during the heat of COVID. Having parked all 10 during the global downturn in air travel, the airline hadn’t planned to bring any of them back to service. Then-CEO Akbar Al Baker famously told me that However, as passenger demand surged and Qatar faced issues getting all of its Airbus A350s into service, it moved to bring back most of its A380 fleet.
Two aircraft (A7-APA and A7-APB) have been permanently retired, but the other eight are happily flying about, serving some of Qatar’s most in-demand routes. I had the opportunity to travel to Doha as a guest of Qatar Airways for the purposes of its . Here’s what it's like in business class on the airline’s largest plane.
Departing from Heathrow’s Terminal 4 is always a bit tedious. No fault of the airline at all, but the location of T4 means arriving by rail at Terminals 2 and 3 and then waiting for an onward train to T4. It only adds maybe 10-15 minutes to the journey, but it’s worth factoring in if you’re not usually a T4 flyer.
Qatar has an exclusive check-in area for its premium passengers in T4. I didn’t really need to check in as I’d already done so online and had carry-on only, but I wanted to get the experience (and the very lovely QR boarding pass!). After check-in, it's through to fast-track security, which was pretty swift and uncomplicated.
Arriving in the departures hall, it's just a short walk to the Qatar Airways .
