Tse Ernest

🐋 Farewell To A Flying Icon: The LAST Beluga ST Retires Tomorrow Tomorrow marks the end of an era for Airbus and the Airbus team in North Wales. The Airbus A300-600ST "Beluga" #5 (F-GSTF) is scheduled to make its final operational flight, resulting in a retirement at Hawarden Airport, North Wales. We're expecting an arrival around 11 am, which will apparently include a farewell flypast over the airfield (weather permitting) to salute the factory where it has collected thousands of wings over the decades. Why the retirement? The "Super Transporter" (ST) fleet, based on the classic A300 airframe, is stepping aside for the modern BelugaXL. The XL, based on the A330, offers 30% more capacity and can carry two A350 wings simultaneously, a feat the original Beluga couldn't manage. While earlier plans saw some STs attempting a second life in commercial cargo (Airbus Beluga Transport), the focus has shifted to fully winding down the ST operations. A Permanent Resident? Unlike its siblings which have been stored or scrapped elsewhere, Beluga #5 is expected to remain at the Broughton site for the foreseeable future, we are unsure what fate the plane holds in the coming months. And sadly, I didn't have any photos of my own of ST5, so I had to use ST3 instead, but I bet those complaining it's the wrong photo haven't read this far anyway ;) Have you ever seen one of these Beluga "ST" aircraft? 👇