Air France's first A380 leaves for JFK

The first Air France A380 superjumbo took off from Paris on Friday, bound for New York with 380 passengers who had bid a total $450,000 in a charity auction organized by the airline.

"It's a dream," said Francois Etienne, a 64-year old aviation fan as he queued up to board Flight AF 380, heading to JFK airport. "I participated in the auction on e-bay, but really on the last day, on the last minute, so I didn't think I would get it. I have to pinch myself to believe it."

The airline said in a statement that the money will go to the Air France Foundation, which helps children in difficulty. Nearly 90% of the bidders were French, the airline said.

Air France is the first European owner of Airbus's biggest plane, which it will fly with 538 seats and is already flown by Singapore Airlines, Emirates and Australia's Qantas.

Air France-KLM CEO Pierre-Henri Gourgeon, whose company this week reported its fourth consecutive quarterly loss and said it will cut 1,700 jobs next year, said buying such an expensive plane shows that the airline group is "very confident about the future."

"We trust the capacity of Air France-KLM to rebound after this very difficult year," he said in a ribbon-cutting ceremony at Charles de Gaulle airport.

An A380 costs $327 million at catalog prices, more than four times the cost of a single-aisle A320. Airlines often negotiate substantial discounts to the list price.

Air France will start full service with the plane on Nov. 23, with daily flights between Paris and New York, and later to Johannesburg.

Airbus has taken 200 orders from 16 customers for the A380, of which it has delivered 20.

Airbus finally handed over the first superjumbo in late 2007 after a series of technical problems and management errors led to almost two years of delay and cost it billions in penalties.

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APTN producer Oleg Cetinic contributed to this report.