Airbus VIP

Lufthansa’s 14th Airbus A380 was given a VIP send-off on Wednesday when it starred in an official naming ceremony performed by German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Freshly christened Deutschland, the aircraft took off next day on Lufthansa’s Frankfurt – San Francisco service.

The ceremony was the highlight of a visit by Dr Merkel to the airline’s Frankfurt hub to open Lufthansa’s new integrated control centre.

This employs 160 staff per shift to supervise and control flights, passenger flow and ground handling from one base.

The chancellor was shown round by Carsten Spohr, chairman of the executive board and CEO of the Lufthansa Group, and also met apprentices training on a Lufthansa Technik training aircraft in a hangar. 

Dr Merkel’s visit symbolised the importance of the airline to the German economy.

With some 37,000 employees, the Lufthansa Group is the largest employer in the German state of Hesse and this summer alone 250 apprentices started training with various Lufthansa Group companies, 150 of them in Frankfurt. 

Lufthansa says it will also hire 1,400 flight attendants this year. www.lufthansa.com

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