G-VWEB: Virgin Atlantic Airbus A340-600

The Airbus A340 is a long-range, wide-body commercial passenger jet airliner that was developed and produced by the European aerospace company Airbus. In the mid-1970s, Airbus conceived several derivatives of the A300, its first airliner, and developed the A340 quadjet in parallel with the A330 twinjet. In June 1987, Airbus launched both designs with their first orders and the A340-300 took its maiden flight on 25 October 1991. It was certified along with the A340-200 on 22 December 1992 and both versions entered service in March 1993 with launch customers Lufthansa and Air France. The larger A340-500/600 were launched on 8 December 1997, the A340-600 flew for the first time on 23 April 2001 and entered service on 1 August 2002. Designed to replace early-generation Boeing 747 airliners, the A340-600 is capable of carrying 379 passengers in a three-class cabin layout 13,900 km (7,500 nmi). It provides similar passenger capacity to a 747 but with 25 percent more cargo volume, and at lower trip and seat costs. The first flight of the A340-600 was made on 23 April 2001.[125] Virgin Atlantic began commercial services in August 2002.[126][127] The variant's main competitor is the 777-300ER. The A340-600 was replaced by the A350-1000.