Category Archives: civil

Veterans’ Alaska 737 – Finally!

Alaska Airlines has a number of jets in special colors. My efforts to finally get the merger jet were covered in this post. One of the other jets that I never managed to catch in California was their Tribute to Service aircraft that is honoring veterans. My friend Roger caught it a number of times but I was always in the wrong place.

Alaska is, despite the name, headquartered in Seattle so their jets are regularly rotating through SeaTac. Shortly after arriving here, I saw that this jet was coming in and, since I was nearby, I decided to see if it could finally catch it. Sure enough, I got it. I would also like to point out the sun and blue skies in this shot for those of you that think I have moved to somewhere where it only rains. It’s true that it does rain but not as much as you think so far!

When United Thought That Ted Was a Winner

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Occasionally I post about disappearing airlines. Normally they are airlines that went away because they ran out of cash. This one is a different story. The arrival of low cost airlines caused a lot of the majors to think that they could fight the newcomers by setting up their own lost cost operation. United came up with Ted. I guess this was like half a United! They moved a bunch of their Airbus A319s and A320s from United to Ted and set them up on services which, I guess, did not have the premium passengers and so was focused on the economy traveler.

Ted lasted for a while. I don’t know whether it was ever a profitable business or not. When you viewed it in the context of the overall United business, it might have been good for a while. However, whatever the underpinnings of the business were, eventually United came to the conclusion that Ted was not a good idea. I don’t know whether the cost base was too high to sustain it or whether it was just undercutting revenue from United but they gave up on the idea. The jets got repainted and became part of the United fleet again.

Boeing 787-10 on Test

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I wrapped up some work in Seattle and was about to head back home when a quick check on FlightRadar24 showed me that the Boeing 787-10 test aircraft was en route back to Boeing Field. It would be rude to ignore that. The weather had been pretty crummy and there was plenty of heavy cloud in the area but it looked like it might brighten up a bit and, as the sun went down, there was a chance of it lighting up beneath the clouds. I sat in the car dealing with some emails and waiting for the arrival.

Sure enough, as the time approached, the sun did start to peep out from beneath the clouds. It was intermittent at first but it became more consistent as Boeing 01 Heavy called up on approach. Meanwhile, a nice black cloud was still lurking in the background. What a great combination that type of light makes. The plane glided down the approach, its trailing static cone hanging from the top of the fin and then it was down. A nice result.

American’s 737s in the Old Scheme

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When American introduced their new colors, there was uproar. The criticism was plentiful. I seemed to be in a very small group of people that actually quite liked the look that they had gone for. Having been a regular customer over a number of years, I had grown tired of what I thought was a dated look. Over time I think people have calmed down about the change and now I don’t hear too much mention of it.

As more of the fleet gets repainted, I now notice more when I see a jet still in the old scheme (except MD-80s which obviously are not going to be repainted given their imminent demise). I have come across a few of the 737-800 jets recently in the metal finish. Here are some of them before they finally disappear for good.

Reverse Ops While I Am Waiting

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As some recent posts have covered, I made a visit to SFO recently to go up the old tower before it was demolished. I got to the airport a little ahead of time so had some time along the bay shore awaiting my time slot. I got some shots of operations while I was there. The wind was out of the south so reverse operations were in effect which is always an interesting change to things. The departures to the east are busy and a little different while the arriving jets come closer to you as they touch down and roll out.

The light was a bit subdued but there were a few heavies arriving. A couple of 747-400s including a Qantas jet and an ANA 777-300ER. However, the sun did pop out briefly as a Hawaiian A330 departed (presumably for Hawaii). The sun caught it quite nicely as it climbed and, in the background you could see one of the jets lining up for arrival on the 19s.

Qatar Amiri Flight 747-8 BBJ

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Just a quick post this time. No big description. While up the old tower at SFO, the Qatar Amiri Flight Boeing 747-8 BBJ was parked across the runway. As private jets go, this is pretty well up there. I haven’t been inside so I don’t know whether it is luxurious but I am willing to bet it doesn’t have a utilitarian feel in there. I doubt I will get to find out though.

A Couple of Connie’s “Finest”

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Red Flag is a time for lots of military aircraft to do their thing. However, it isn’t only the military that show up. Transporting everything that is required to support lots of deploying jets might be done by military transports but it is not unusual for civilian organizations to get some work. Whether it was Red Flag support or something else, we got to see a couple of 747-400 freighters while we were there. Both of them came from the same company, Kalitta.

One of the jets was fully painted up and showed up on the approach one day. It flew a straight in approach and landed to either deposit or pick up some bulky items. The second jet was a bit different. First, it was in plane white with just some Kalitta markings. More importantly, it arrived during a Red a Flag mission. It ended up holding overhead for a long time while the launch was underway. Finally they brought them down for an approach. However, it wasn’t clear which way they would come. Nellis has a habit of bringing jets in from different ends almost at whim.

At first it looked like they would land on the 21s. Then they looked like they would go to the other end. We jumped in the car and headed that way. Just as we were getting close, the jet turned away and headed east. We did a quick about turn and followed suit. We hadn’t gone too far when they reversed course. Where they deliberately toying with us? Another quick reversal and we were getting close but now they were turning on to final. Time ran out and we pulled in to a parking lot by a tire dealership just as it came in to view. We had to work for that one.

Boomerang

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This plane is a great example of what an imaginative mind can achieve when combined with an understanding of aerodynamics. It is one of the products of the talent that is Burt Rutan. When Burt ran Scaled Composites, he specialized in creating aircraft that were out of the ordinary and yet capable performers. The Boomerang is an asymmetric airframe that provides twin engine performance with more benign handling in an engine out configuration. I came upon it during a visit to Oshkosh for Airventure.

The owner at the time was very happy to share his aircraft with anyone who was interested and, given the unusual nature of the plane and the fascination people have with Rutan’s creations, he was never short of visitors. I didn’t spend much time with him but, while I was there, I was struggling to find angles to shoot the plane from to emphasize what makes it special. Getting it in flight would have helped but it was fun checking it out while it was on the ground.

FAA Jets With Extra Bits

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The engineer in me is always pleased by a plane with extra bits added. This Learjet 60 was departing San Jose. As it taxied out, you could see a lot of extra probes on the front fuselage and some antennae on the fin. It is a Federal Aviation Administration jet, hence its abbreviated registration number. I assume it is used for flight checking services when the performance of things like instrument landing systems is calibrated. Whatever it does, it has a few added extras compared to the average bizjet.

777 Freighters at O’Hare

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Nothing terribly timely about this post. These shots were taken quite a while ago during a visit to Chicago. (At least they are so old that they are from when I lived there.) There was a time when the 747 was the freighter of choice. There are still missions for which the 747 is still required but few loads require the nose loading and the most versatile of the big freighters these days is the 777. (It seems that the 777 is taking over everything that the 747 used to do.)

One afternoon at O’Hare included a couple of 777 freighters. AeroLogic had one of theirs in town. I saw it coming in and also got so see it head out again. I don’t know where it was coming from or going to. Meanwhile, Air France also had one of their freighters making an appearance. It’s a shame that the 747 is not so prevalent anymore. It is a cooler looking jet and the 777 freighter is barely distinguishable from the multitude of 777s on passenger duty. However, that is the way it is these days.