Gizmodo: emirates

Get Into the Most Luxurious Airbus A380 On the Planet

Jesus Diaz — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 19:06:00 EST

Mary Kirby is one lucky, spoiled Runway Girl: She gets to fly all around the world in the best seats of the best planes. However, she has never experienced anything as amazing as her trip in Emirates' Airbus A380.

Not only the first class is actually a super-first class with seats bigger than my apartment, but the Airbus A380 is so huge that Emirates' business class actually feels like the first class from the rest of the airlines. I have to admit that, despite all that horrible gold and rose wood naffness, I'm impressed. [FlightGlobal]

iPhone Translation App Speaks Three Languages With Your Mouth

John Herrman — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 11:19:12 EST

Somewhere on the App Store spectrum, between the travel phrasebooks and those apps that replace your mouth with a slightly weirder mouth, you'll find iLingual, an app that steals your lips, and uses them to speak three different languages.

Here's how it works: you snap a picture of a mouth—yours, your girlfriend's, or just a photo from a magazine—which iLingual then analyzes and converts for animation. Then, you choose a phrase from the app's 400-strong library, hold your iPhone over your mouth and there, you sort speak French, German or a little bit of Arabic, with a disconcertingly segmented, animated pair of lips. Félicitations!

This really shouldn't be more useful than a standard prerecorded phrasebook, but it definitely is. Nobody likes tourists, and the genius of iLingual is that by using it, you're making fun of yourself; you're giving people something—a small amount of your dignity, or if you're lucky, a laugh—in exchange for their help. iLingual is a sponsored app, so it's completely free. [iTunes]

Tailcam Video Shows Awesome Plane's-Eye-View of A380 in Flight

Kit Eaton — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 10:00:00 EDT

This video is a feed from the Tailcam in an A380 as the aircraft takes-off. The cam feed can be shown on the seat-back displays and gives you an almost Superman-like view of the aircraft from 79-feet up at the top of the tail. It's pretty amazing watching the behemoth aircraft surge slowly down the runway and into the air... and there's another vid, showing it landing in to SFO as part of the recent Emirates tour.

This amazing system can also show you a view forward from the nose, and straight down beneath the plane. I'm pretty sure if you're trapped in a center-aisle seat it may well make up for your lack of window view. And it's a great chance to freak out (just a little bit) your nervous-flyer partners or parents... well, if your Mom is like mine, anyway. [Irintech via New Launches]

Biggest Airplane Model in the World Eaten by Biggest Cargo Aircraft

Jesus Diaz — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 08:00:00 EDT

This is an Airbus A380—the largest passenger aircraft in the world—eaten alive by an Antonov AN-124—the largest mass-produced cargo airplane in the world (which I filmed inside at Dubai's airport). Before you exclaim "Photoshop!", this is a real photo by Dmitry Avdeev. However, it's not a real A380: it's a 1/3 scale model, which makes it the biggest aircraft replica in the world. So big, in fact, that its 87-feet wingspan is 3 feet and 4 inches wider than a real Concorde. Seeing it completely built in video gives you an idea of its gigantic scale.

The Emirates A380 model has been placed at the Heathrow Airport roundabout previously known as the Concorde Roundabout—because it had a replica of that plane. It's not made of Lego bricks, but given the fact that it is bigger than my apartment, I won't mind living in one. [Emirates]

Photos Emerge of Emirates A380 Showers: Tiny, But Luxurious

Kit Eaton — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 07:44:00 EDT

See that happy-looking lady in the pic? She's standing in an Emirates A380 in-flight shower room, details of which have emerged after we first alerted you to this airborne luxury. The "shower spas" are pretty decently kitted-out, and the aircraft carries an extra 1,100-pounds of water to allow every one of the 14 first-class passengers to have a splash. As a result, the shower only runs for five minutes, and there's a traffic-light system to let you know how the time's going. And if you're planning on trying to form a new "mile-high, in the shower" club, you'd better forget it: the showers are small, "designed for single usage."

That extra 1,000 pounds of water (25% more than usual) means the aircraft will have to carry more fuel, which may weigh heavy on your environmental conscience. Or maybe lying in your massage bed in the private first class room, with remote-control doors and mini bar will make you forget your woes. [Mail on Sunday]

Emirates the First Airline to Allow Inflight Calls from Passenger Cellphones

AddyDugdale — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 06:32:13 EDT

Dubai-based airline Emirates has claimed the first ever permitted mobile phone call from a commercial flight. The conversations took place aboard a Casablanca-bound Airbus A340 that had been kitted out with a system that stops cellphones from messing with the plane's electronics. By the end of the year its passengers will be able to clack away on their BlackBerries and use other data services, such as sending texts. Calls on night flights will not be allowed, and the crews will be allowed to prohibit yakking whenever they feel like it. The only stipulation is that cell users, who can only make calls when at cruising height keep their phones switched to silent—thank God—during flights. [BBC Online]