If you have been flying to or from Bangkok Suvarnabhumi Airport or U-Tapao Rayong Pattaya International Airport in Thailand, you have probably spotted a fleet of Airbus A380 airliners sitting around doing absolutely nothing, and this has been the case for a few years.
The Airbus aircraft have been sitting abandoned in the sun at the Bangkok airport for some time, and the paintwork has faded quite badly due to the length of time they have been sitting around. The fact that Airbus A380s are sitting abandoned is quite a shock.
But once you dig into why they are there, it starts to make perfect sense. The A380, the world's biggest airliner, is an expensive aircraft to fly and maintain, and some airlines have already retired their fleet of these jumbo jets. British Airways is one of them.
It transpires that the Covid-19 pandemic is one reason the Thai Airbus jets are sitting idle at the airport. The pandemic massively impacted global air travel, and its effects are still being felt just a few years on; these Airbus jets are a reminder of the impact it has had.
A few years before the pandemic hit, Thai Airways was one of those that decided to heavily invest in a new fleet of airliners. It chose the A380, with its capacity one of the aircraft's biggest incentives. It was seen as a direct rival to the Boeing 747; however, history hasn't played out quite as Airbus would have hoped.
When the pandemic hit, many airlines stopped nearly every flight they had. There was no holiday demand, and flights for work were limited, and Thai Airways was one airline that grounded virtually its entire fleet. That led to the unusual sight of relatively new airliners, including the A380s, sitting at Thailand's Bangkok Suvarnabhumi Airport awaiting their next call-up. For some of the aircraft, though, that call simply never came.
Thai Airways aircraft continued to sit at the airport, and at least four of the giant airliners were spotted parked up. From images shared online, three look complete, while a fourth appears to have been stripped of some parts to keep other aircraft in the sky. Six years after the pandemic hit, the jets are still sitting at the airport. Plans to put them back into operation in 2022 were eventually abandoned, and the most recent reports suggest that Thai Airways will sell the aircraft off, either for spare parts or so another airline can operate them.
There is, however, a happy ending for one A380 in Thailand. Airbus A380 HS-TUE, one of six that Thai Airways operated, was also one of the jets parked at the airport when the pandemic hit. But Thai Airways was able to sell the aircraft, and it was cut into sections and then moved 20 miles from the airport to a location on Sukhumvit Road. But it hadn't been moved for scrapping. In fact, the giant airliner had been preserved and would serve a new purpose.
The jet has since become a food and drink destination, with it situated around a large night market, with Friday and Saturday evenings particularly busy. It is one of just a handful of A380s that are preserved and on display, with a couple of the earlier aircraft preserved in Europe. Images from July 2026 show the Thai Airbus has very much become a popular tourist attraction, with it appearing that there is now access to the inside of the jet, with a lot of its interior preserved to show what it looked like when in service.
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