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Airbus's massive new cargo plane that looks like a whale is now fully operational

The Airbus Beluga cargo plane fleet is tasked with transporting large sections of Airbus aircraft for final assembly.

Airbus Beluga XL
  • The company's newest and largest variant, the BelugaXL, just began operational service in January and is now flying full-time.
  • The current fleet of five Airbus A300-600ST has been in service for 20 years.
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Airbus' newest airplane that regular passengers won't be able to fly on is now flying full-time in Europe.

The BelugaXL cargo plane just entered operational service and is now transporting Airbus cargo, CNN reported, following months of test flights.

The Beluga is a cargo plane designedto transport major sections of Airbus planes to its assembly plants in Toulouse, France and Hamburg, Germany from suppliers around Europe.

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It flies pieces as large as the middle and rear fuselage of an Airbus A320 airliner or the wing of an A350 widebody. Airbus also uses a fleet of barges and trucks to move components around Europe.

The BelugaXL will take over for the current generation A300-600ST Beluga that has been in service for two decades. Since it's based on the Airbus A330-200F freighter, the BelugaXL is larger, with greater cargo capacity, and is expected to deliver superior performance than its predecessor.

The Beluga derives its name from the whale to which it bears a striking resemblance. In fact, the new BelugaXL is even painted to look like the animal.

According to Airbus, it decided to build the BelugaXL in November 2014 as a response to the greater transport and capacity requirements the company expects in the years beyond 2019.

Here's a closer look at the Airbus Beluga and BelugaXL.

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Benjamin Zhang contributed to an earlier version of this article.

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