A spin into the future on the Airbus A380

John Leahy, the master salesman of Airbus, was reeling off trivia as the A380 roared down a rain-swept runway here Wednesday, carrying 200 journalists on the first major demonstration flight of this double-deck jet, the world's largest passenger aircraft.

"Did you know you could fit 35 million Ping-Pong balls in an A380?" Leahy, chief operating officer for customers, asked his seatmate on the plane's capacious upper deck. "Or that it weighs as much as 500 Volkswagen Golfs?"

Once the A380 was aloft, cruising above the snow-capped Pyrenees, the flight felt fairly ordinary — like taking out the family van with 200 unruly children in the back. But it also showed off the charms of a 519-seat airplane. Even with all the journalists and their gear, there were acres of empty seats.

Not to belabor the point, but this thing is big.