Emirates Airline revealed a new custom A380 livery featuring Dubai’s newest landmark, the Museum of the Future, for 10 of its superjumbos.
The first Emirates A380 (A6-EVK) with the new livery will take flight on Thursday to Los Angeles, the airline said in a statement on Wednesday.
Nine other A380 jets with the new livery will be rolled out “over the coming weeks” and will be operated on routes to Europe as well as key Arab regional cities. The 10 jets will fly to 30 destinations around the world in the coming year, the airline said.
The seven-storey Museum of the Future opened to the public on February 22. The striking structure stands 78 metres tall and was named as one of the 14 most beautiful museums on the planet in a list compiled by National Geographic magazine in July.
The pillarless museum houses a series of interactive exhibitions that give visitors a chance to experience the technologies and trends that promise to shape the future of humanity.
Spanning 30,000 square metres, the museum is designed to foster collaborative innovation among intellectuals and scientists, and inspire solutions across the areas of sustainability, outer space, health and other critical global challenges.
It also aims to be a platform to demonstrate the latest technological discoveries, with prototypes that will evolve from emerging start-ups and established technology enterprises.
The ring-shaped, Arabic calligraphy encapsulated building will encircle both sides of the Emirates A380 aircraft with the message ‘Journey to the future’ inscribed across the fuselage, covering 336 square metres of the plane, Emirates said.
The facade is also decorated with quotes from Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, Vice President and Ruler of Dubai.
Inside the Museum of the Future - in pictures
Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
