One of two airlines flying the world's biggest plane to the US is pulling the aircraft off the route because of the economic downturn. Dubai-based Emirates said it would replace two double-decker Airbus A380s it uses on a daily Dubai-New York flight with smaller Boeing 777s starting June 1.

A second daily roundtrip already using the same type of Boeing plane remains unchanged. The turnaround comes less than eight months after Emirates debuted the wide-body "superjumbo" in the US amid much fanfare. Since then, American household and company travel budgets have grown increasingly strained as the country slipped deeper into recession.