Two Singapore Airlines (SIA) Airbus A380s were hauled for the final time in a few hours to Changi Exhibition Centre, where they will be disassembled.
This is the first time SIA has scrapped its superjumbos in the country.
The jets, with registration numbers 9V-SKH and 9V-SKG, are among seven A380s that SIA stated in November last year it would retire, despite a first-half net loss of S$3.5 billion owing to the COVID-19 epidemic.
According to data from the aviation website Planespotters, the planes were delivered in May and June 2009.
Five previously retired SIA A380s – all of which had been in service for roughly a decade – were flown overseas before being stored or dismantled.
“From my perspective, usually aircraft are parted out overseas,” FlightGlobal Asia managing editor Greg Waldron told CNA. “It’s quite a big industrial operation to part out aircraft.”
According to an SIA spokeswoman, the choice to scrap the A380s domestically was influenced by issues such as the experience of local and international vendors, the closing of international borders, and the expense of disassembling the plane.
The towing operation was organized by Hunt Way Management Consultancy Services, according to a road closure notice posted on the Land Transport Authority’s OneMotoring website.