Now you can join the Mile High Club OFFICIALLY!!

Joining the Mile High Club easier after world's biggest aeroplane introduces double beds

Last updated at 13:59pm on 15th October 2007 Comments (1)

Luxury cabins will return to the skies this month with the launch of a new 'super-first' class on the Airbus A380 double decker.

Singapore Airlines, which took delivery of the first of 19 A380s in Toulouse today, revealed that the planes will have 12 private suites for its top paying passengers - meaning its never been so easy to join the Mile High Club.

Services start on the Singapore-Sydney route on 25 October, with a London to Singapore service to be introduced early next year.

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Spacious: the A380 can carry 850 people but Singapore will only have 471 seats

The fully enclosed private suites, which hark back to the 'golden age' of flying boats in the Thirties and Forties, were designed by yacht designer Jean-Jacques Coste.

Each suite contains a leather seat and a full-sized bed with mattress. Unlike many airline 'flat beds' no part of the seat converts into the bed. The bed will be made up by cabin crew with Givenchy-designed duvets and cushions. The two middle suites can be converted into doubles for couples.

Entertainment is provided through a 23-inch flat-screen TV, with a choice of 100 films and 180 TV programmes, and 700 CDs.

The A380 will have 471 seats - the 12 suites, 60 in business class and 399 in economy.

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Joining the Mile High Club is set to become easier on this Singapore Airlines jumbo plane

Yap Kim Wah, of Singapore Airlines, said: "Customers can look forward to their own private cabin in the sky."

Airbus claims the aircraft will transform travellers' experience of flying by offering a much quieter and more spacious cabin than its rivals.

It can carry up to 853 passengers in an economy class-only configuration, but most airlines are expected to take advantage of the extra space and carry fewer people in more luxury.

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Private luxury: passengers will be able to travel from Sydney to Singapore in their own cabin later this month. A London service will be introduced next year

Toulouse-based Airbus boasts that the new aircraft will have a greatly reduced environment impact, describing it as "greener, cleaner, quieter and smarter".

Compared with the Boeing 747-400 jumbo jets, the A380 makes a quarter of the noise coming into land, uses 12 per cent less fuel and produces 17 per cent less carbon dioxide.

Delays to the project, caused in part by problems with the complicated wiring for the A380's entertainment system, put production back two years and shook Airbus's parent company, EADS.

News of further setbacks to the programme made public in June last year knocked 26 per cent off the EADS share price and led to the resignations of three senior executives.

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The Airbus 380 has finally been delivered after a series of setbacks

Allegations emerged this week of "massive insider trading" by senior Airbus and EADS managers in the run-up to the announcement.

France's stock market regulator has sent prosecutors in Paris a preliminary report into the affair based on an investigation of share sales made by 21 executives between November 2005 and March 2006.