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The Airbus A330 is a wide-body twin-engine jet airliner made by Airbus, a division of EADS. Versions of the A330 have a range of and can accommodate up to 335 passengers in a two-class layout or carry of cargo. The origin of the A330 dates to the 1970s as one of several conceived derivatives of Airbus's first airliner, the A300. The A330 was developed in parallel with the A340, which shared many common airframe components but differed in number of engines. Both airliners incorporated fly-by-wire flight control technology, first introduced on an Airbus aircraft with the A320, as well as the A320's six-display glass cockpit. In June 1987, after receiving orders from various customers, Airbus launched the A330 and A340. The A330 was Airbus's first airliner offered with the choice of three engines: General Electric, Pratt & Whitney, and Rolls-Royce. The A330-300, the first variant, took its maiden flight in November 1992 and entered passenger service with Air Inter in January 1994. Responding to dwindling sales, Airbus followed up with the slightly shorter A330-200 variant in 1998, which has proved more popular. Subsequently developed A330 variants include a dedicated freighter, the A330-200F, and a military tanker, the A330 MRTT. The A330 MRTT formed the basis of the proposed KC-45, entered into the U.S. Air Force's KC-X competition in conjunction with Northrop Grumman, where after an initial win, on appeal lost to Boeing's tanker. Since its launch, the A330 has allowed Airbus to expand market share in wide-body airliners. Airlines have selected the A330 as a replacement for less economical trijets and versus rival twinjets. Boeing has offered variants of the 767 and 777 as competitors, along with the 787 which entered service in 2011. Airbus's A350 will also share this wide-body airliner market. As of June 2011 the A330's order book stood at 1,140, of which 796 had been delivered. The largest operator is Cathay Pacific with 33 aircraft. The A330 is expected to continue selling until at least 2015. ==Airline operators== On 12 March 1987, Airbus received the first orders for the twinjet. The domestic French airline Air Inter (then Air France Europe) placed five firm orders and 15 options while Thai Airways International requested eight aircraft, split evenly between firm orders and options. The following day, Airbus announced that it planned to formally launch the A330/A340 programme by mid-April 1987, and was on track to deliver the first A340 by May 1992 and the A330 the following year. On 31 March, Northwest Airlines followed Air Inter and Thai by signing a letter of intent for 20 A340s and 10 A330s.〔 Air Inter became the first operator of the A330 after accepting delivery on 30 December 1993 and placing the aircraft into service on 17 January 1994 between Orly Airport and Marseille. Deliveries to Malaysia Airlines (MAS) and Thai Airways International were postponed due to delamination of the composite materials in the engine thrust reverser assembly. Thai Airways received its first A330 during the second half of the year, operating it on routes to Taipei and Seoul from Bangkok on 19 December 1994. MAS received its A330 on 1 February 1995 then rescheduled deliveries of the 10 other aircraft on order.〔 Cathay Pacific received Trent 700s days after MAS following the certification of the engine on 22 December 1994.〔 A list of active and former operators of the Airbus A330, as of 14 March 2015:〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「List of Airbus A330 operators」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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