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Emirates Airbus A380 'too quiet' to allow sleep to pilots!

          London: Emirates Airbus A380 pilots are finding it difficult to sleep during rest breaks in the crew rest area - because the aircraft is "too quiet". The pilots are complaining that they cannot sleep in the crew-rest area in the rear of the main deck for they are constantly disturbed by sounds created by passengers. The lack of engine noise in the A380's cabin compared with other long-haul airliners means they are constantly disturbed by sounds created by passengers, such as crying babies, flushing vacuum toilets and call bells. Sometimes, passengers also mistake the rest area for a lavatory, and pull the door handle. Emirates senior vice-president, fleet, Capt Ed Davidson said that the have has asked Airbus for a solution. They have ruled out insulating the walls of the rest area, situated at the rear of the all-economy main deck. "We are expecting to hear back from them by the middle of the month," Flightinternational.com quoted Davidson as saying. He said that one option could be installing lightweight generators to create ambient noise. "We're getting a lot of complaints. It's not something we expected. "On our other aircraft, the engines drown out the cabin noise. [On the A380] the pilots sleep with earplugs but the cabin noise goes straight through them," he added.
-Dec 5, 2008