Comment by jpgvm

The plane was a significant factor but you really shouldn't look past the calibre of expertise in the cabin on this particular flight.

> 5 pilots were in the cockpit of this flight. In addition to the normal crew of pilot-in-command and co-pilot, there was an experienced relief pilot and two additional check captains; one was being trained as a check captain (CC) and the supervising CC, who was training the CC.

Captain Richard Champion de Crespigny had 35 years of flying experience at the time of the incident.

That is an insane amount of flight experience in the cockpit and all of the reports state this was a very significant factor. i.e by allowing distribution of the task load, plenty of time for one of the pilots to compute landing calculations manually etc.

THe A380 is a flying tank no doubt, but it wasn't the sole factor here - I think most people would agree this one was a shared victory.