Portuguese wet-lease operator Hi Fly is today putting its Airbus A380 back into service for Air Austral following the jet's 7 September airbridge collision at Paris Charles de Gaulle.
While being towed empty to the boarding gate for a departure to Reunion, the aircraft had sustained "minor damage" to the lip of the air intake on one of its engines as a result of a "slight touch" with an airbridge which "was not fully retracted for reasons that Air Austral is investigating", says Hi Fly.
Apart from the need to replace the intake lip, "no other findings resulted from the inspections required by Airbus and Hi Fly", it adds.
Hi Fly expects that the aircraft will today make its return to operations on "the longest domestic nonstop route in the world": Paris-Reunion.
Air Austral's website indicates that the 11h flight covers a distance of 9,634km (5,208nm).
Source: Cirium Dashboard
