Category Archives: aircraft

Air Canada Instead of Jetz

It’s not unusual to see Canadian A320s in Boeing Field.  They provide a lot of sports charters but, until recently, these were usually undertaken by Jetz aircraft.  More recently, it seems that they have transitioned to jets in the Air Canada core colors.  Since Air Canada has been taking delivery of lots of 737 Max aircraft recently, maybe they are cascading some of the older mainline jets to the charter operations.  I don’t really know.  I only know I have shot a few of their aircraft at Boeing Field recently.

Ault Field Morning Arrivals

I had taken a day off to go to Coupeville earlier this year.  Since I was heading to Whidbey Island for the day, I went to Ault Field at the beginning of the day to see if there was any traffic.  I went to Moran Beach to see if anything was coming in when the light is still favorable in that location.  I actually got pretty lucky.  There were a bunch of Growlers already up and about and they were recovering before I had to move off.  Some squadron jets including some in special schemes were coming in.  Recovering overhead me while others were on the approach, it felt pretty busy.  Here are some of the shots from that morning.

Sun on the MU-2

Regular readers of the blog will know that there are certain types that I seem destined to struggle to shoot in decent light.  It might be the nicest of days, but the sun will go behind a cloud just before the intended subject appears.  I thought the Mitsubishi MU-2 was one of those types but, a few months back, I finally got lucky.  One came into Boeing Field on a day with good sun.  Not the perfect conditions but it was still a relief to finally get some shots when it wasn’t overcast!

SEA Saturday Afternoon Departures

Earlier in the year, I was down at SEA for a reason that now escapes me.  However, I had some time to kill, and the traffic was on a northerly flow which means it is easier to get reasonable afternoon light on the departing jets.  Consequently, I hung out for a while to photograph some of the jets heading out.  The majority of traffic is going to be the regular Alaska and Delta narrowbody traffic and that gets pretty repetitive.  However, mid to late afternoon is when a lot of the departures for Europe and the Middle East take place.  This means widebodies.  Here are a bunch of shots of departing aircraft as they climb out and head on their way.

Gliding at Arlington

Arlington Municipal Airport has a steady stream of light aircraft activity, but it is also home to a gliding community.  At weekends, it is not unusual to see some Piper Pawnees tugging gliders into the air.  Depending on the suitability of the conditions, these might be some pretty short flights, or they might be up for quite a while.  I have been up there at various times when the gliders are operating off the grass next to the main runway.  Usually, I am there for something else, so the gliding photos are taken when the opportunity arises.  Here are some shots of the Pawnee tug planes and the gliders themselves.

Playing With the Bizjets to Experiment

I have been messing around with low shutter speeds for traffic at Boeing Field a lot this year.  Some of those shots have made their way into posts on here.  One sunny afternoon, I was at the field and there was a lot of business jet traffic but nothing terribly special.  This provides a good opportunity to try different things.  I had the polarizer and a neutral density filter.  The polarizer is good on sunny days for taking down the glare and it also cuts the light.  However, the neutral density can really pull the shutter speed down.

Since I didn’t care if the shots were a failure, I was willing to just keep bringing the shutter speed down and down.  I compensated by cranking up the frame rate in order to increase the probability of getting a sharp one.  This is an interesting challenge.  Normally I spend a bit of time culling out shots that just aren’t sharp but, when playing with silly shutter speeds, you need to re-calibrate just how sharp things should be.  What is a little off when zoomed in might be of no concern when looking at the full image.  That is not an excuse to let plainly bad shots through though.

Here are some of the results that weren’t too bad.  Even an average Challenger can look a little more interesting with a very blurry background!

Everts MD-83 Freighter While I Am Waiting

My buddy Chris was visiting Seattle but was stuck in the arrivals line at the airport.  I was waiting to pick him up but, since it was taking longer than expected, I was checking out some other movements.  An Everts MD-83 was scheduled out of Boeing Field.  The weather was not great, and I didn’t know when Chris would finally get through immigration, but I figured I would give it a go.  Sadly for Chris, the MD-83 got moving faster than him.  It was on its way long before he finally got out.  I had plenty of time to get back to SEA to pick him up.

Bulgarian L39

I was doing a favor for a guy I know back from Chicago.  He is researching Bulgarian aircraft that have found their way to the US and one of the planes he was interested in is an L39 Albatros that lives up at not too far from me.  I went up to meet with the owner and get copies of the aircraft documentation.  When I was done, he offered to take me to have a look at the plane in his hangar.  It is a lovely looking jet.  It was in amongst a bunch of other stuff in the hangar which made getting nice shots of it a little tricky, but it was still good to get shots of it.

Frontier’s A321neo Special

Frontier Airlines has been adding a bunch of A321neos to its fleet.  They are not a regular feature at SEA but they do come in periodically.  The airline has at least one that is painted in a special green livery incorporating Pratt and Whitney imagery including a bald eagle.  This is to signify the environmental benefits of the latest generation of jets.  I actually saw one when I was elsewhere in the country.  It was parked on a pier I could see but I didn’t have my camera available to get a shot in the nice evening light there was at the time.

Fortunately, it showed up as coming to Seattle one weekend.  I figured I would get another chance at it.  However, the weather wasn’t looking great.  There was a hint that things might improve so I made my way there to see if I would get lucky.  Sadly, the forecast was a little optimistic and it was still rather gloomy when the jet made an appearance.  I made the best of it that I could but it was not great.  Amazingly, I have had a long time since taking this shot and have yet to have another chance to shoot this jet.  I think it may have visited but there was no way for me to be there.  Hopefully I’ll catch it in good light one day!

Someone Forgot to Close the Gas Cap

Talon Air’s Hawker 4000 came to Boeing Field and my shots of its arrival have already had their own post.  However, while I was reviewing the shots when I got home, something seemed a little odd between the shots.  Something seemed to be flapping around on the lower rear fuselage.  I zoomed in to the shots and there was an access panel that was unsecured.  Its angle was changing between shots, so it was clearly moving around in the airflow.  From what I can gather, this is probably where the fueling port is located.  These doors are tough, so it was probably fine, but I wonder whether any damage was done on a long flight.