Emirates Airbus A380 damaged during Dubai maintenance work

An Airbus A380 owned by Emirates was damaged during maintenance work in Dubai on August 22, the airline confirmed to Gulf Business in a statement.

“We confirm there was an incident when our engineering team was performing a routine A-check on one of our A380s in the hangar,” a spokesperson for the airline said.

“We are investigating the cause internally. All our employees are safe and unhurt. Safety is our number one priority, and we follow stringent safety and technical standards.”

Images posted to social media reportedly show the damaged nose of an Airbus A380 in a maintenance hangar in Dubai. The Aviation Safety Network – a part of the Flight Safety Foundation – claimed in a post on its website the aircraft “sustained serious damaged to the nose in a maintenance mishap at Dubai Airport. The nose landing gear apparently retracted, causing the nose to hit the ground.”

The post claims the damaged aircraft first flew in 2015.

The specific model is alleged to be an A380-861, according to Aviation Safety Network.

No details about when and which aircraft, but this @emirates A380 fell hard on its nose. Door 1 Left seems missing.
Pic found by @vhaq_aero. Any more info? pic.twitter.com/ZNgtNxWuGy

— A380 fanclub (@a380fanclub) August 23, 2019

Emirates is the world’s largest operator of the A380, the biggest passenger airliner on earth. It has more than 110 of the aircraft in service.

Emirates has a reputation as one of the world’s safest airlines. According to AirlineRatings, the airline has never had a fatality aboard one of its flights in almost 35 years of operation. Furthermore, its first – and so far only – hull loss was in 2016.