First Airbus A380 lands at Rome Fiumicino airport

On Jun. 6, 2011, the first (long awaited) Emirates Airbus 380 landed at Rome Fiumicino. It was a one-off trip to celebrate Fiumicino airport’s 50th anniversary, along with 150th anniversary of Italian unification. The Super Jumbo (A6-EDJ) replaced the usual B777 scheduled service on the Dubai-Rome route: EK 97 departing Dubai at 08.55 LT and arriving in Rome at 13.15LT (the A380 actually landed at 13.30LT). The flight left Fiumicino at 17.03 (scheduled time 16.45LT) with an expected arrival time in Dubai at 00.40LT on Jun. 7.

Emirates had initially planned the upgrade of the EK097/098 DBX-FCO-DBX daily flights from the Boeing B777-300 (B773) to the Airbus A380-800 (A388) in Dec. 2009.

Looks like the EK98 had to perform some orbits before landing at Dubai:

About David Cenciotti

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David Cenciotti is a journalist based in Rome, Italy. He is the Founder and Editor of “The Aviationist”, one of the world’s most famous and read military aviation blogs. Since 1996, he has written for major worldwide magazines, including Air Forces Monthly, Combat Aircraft, and many others, covering aviation, defense, war, industry, intelligence, crime and cyberwar. He has reported from the U.S., Europe, Australia and Syria, and flown several combat planes with different air forces. He is a former 2nd Lt. of the Italian Air Force, a private pilot and a graduate in Computer Engineering. He has written five books and contributed to many more ones.