Category Archives: civil

Tiger Moth Flying

With so many things going on, I realized it had been a while since I made a trip up to Sonoma Skypark for the normal Saturday activities. I arrived and spent time with my friend Eric discussing many things aeronautical. While we talked, a Tiger Moth flew back into the pattern. We stopped to watch it for a moment and Eric assumed I had flown in one before – he couldn’t believe an aviation enthusiast from the UK could possibly not have done so. However, I hadn’t.

As it was, Eric got in discussion regarding an issue with the engine with Mike, the owner of the aircraft. Eric thought a short flight would be necessary to help diagnose the issue and thought I should provide ballast. I was not going to turn down this opportunity.

The flight was a short one as was required to check out the engine. We took off, climbed to a moderate height, flew a couple of turns and then returned to Skypark. It was a remarkably smooth aircraft and seemed to just glide through the air. Eric pointed out the guy with the stick might have something to do with that (for those of you who are photographers the assumption you must have a great camera will spring to mind) and, while I was certainly appreciative of Eric’s flying, I did like how the Tiger Moth flew.

Not sure when I will next get a chance to fly in the type but it was certainly great to experience and my thanks to Mike for letting me ride in his plane and to Eric for taking me up.

Deutsches Museum

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A friend of mine was discussing his imminent travel plans. Part of this is taking in Munich, a city we visited a few years ago when another friend was living there. The Deutsches Museum is on the itinerary for my friend’s current trip and it brought to mind the aircraft collection there. The museum is a marvelous place covering a wide variety of industrial, technological and scientific subjects. A day is required if you visit but you will still leave much unseen. The location of Messerschmitt and succeeding companies nearby means they have access to many great aircraft and the collection is outstanding.

On a previous visit in the early 90s, they had some other aircraft, some of which were outside. Some of these have now moved to another location where a second museum facility has been established. I was unable to fit in a visit there but if I ever get back to Munich, it will be on my list.

Fleet Week

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Fleet Week in San Francisco was something I had been looking forward to since moving here. The air display over the bay had looked great in shots I had seen from previous years and that combined with the parade of naval ships sounded good. Sadly, things didn’t quite go to plan. The parade of ships happened but there weren’t very many of them so it was not a huge parade. Then the flying started but, with cloud cover coming in from the Golden Gate, the flying tended to be pushed farther into the bay and away from us.

We did get a couple of V-22s doing a tour of the bay before the real flying display kicked off and the weather improved for Fat Albert’s part of the Blue Angels’ performance. However, the cloud came right back and the Blues did a few orbits above the clouds over us and then gave up. Apparently the weather was better on the following days but I could not be there for that so I missed out. However, I got to spend the day with a couple of friends so it was still better than being at work!

Mustangs Day

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Another day out took me to Vacaville to visit Nut Tree Airport for their Mustangs Day. While I wasn’t planning this as a feature for Global Aviation Resource, I did end up putting together a BloGAR piece for the site about the day out. A slightly less formal write up which is more about my day than the event. If you want to check it out, the link is below.

http://www.globalaviationresource.com/v2/2014/11/14/bloggar-rob-edgcumbe-nut-tree-mustang-days-2014/

If you don’t check that out (please do though), here is a smaller sample of the aircraft that were around that day. I was getting a little silly playing with very slow shutter speeds so some things did not come out as planned but it was fun all the same.

Red Bull Air Race

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The Red Bull Air Race series was restarted for 2014 after a three year break. I have to admit I thought it wouldn’t come back when they stopped previously but I was wrong and this year seems to have been a successful one for them. The neutralized engine approach has certainly made the competition a lot closer. I was covering the event for Global Aviation Resource and the link below will take you to the article I wrote.

http://www.globalaviationresource.com/v2/wp-admin/post.php?post=40015&action=edit

The Red Bull team provided a great facility for the media. We had three rooms with power and internet connectivity and food was provided throughout the day. Needless to say, if you wanted something to drink, there was plenty of Red Bull available! It had been a while since I had drunk it (and previously it might have been close to some vodka) but it was actually pretty good stuff. Doubt it shall be a regular feature for me though. These shots are some of the racers combined with a few of the other parts of the event that didn’t get so much attention in the feature.

Wings Over Wine Country

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After a bit of a dry patch for GAR, I have been able to put together a number of pieces for them. Some are more interesting than others to me. I prefer to be able to tell a story about a person or operation that is not something people will normally see. However, I will have the odd report from an air show if I end up going to one – something that I do less than I used to.

One show I did get to was Wings Over Wine Country in Santa Rosa. The link will take you to the piece I wrote on the show. It was a good little show. It had a pretty reasonable selection of performers for its size. Some were of more interest to me than others. Photography was tricky since the lighting gets progressively worse as the day goes on. http://www.globalaviationresource.com/v2/2014/10/06/airshow-review-wings-over-wine-country-2014/

I did enjoy shooting the finale of the show. A USMC V-22 Osprey wrapped up proceedings. It was not a very dynamic display but it did give me a chance to try a lot of shots of the tilt-rotor in flight. The slow turning rotors are a nightmare for photographers since they appear frozen at all but the lowest shutter speeds. I took the chance to see just how low I could go!

Clear Lake Splash In

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I took a trip a few hours north of here to check out the Clear Lake Splash In. It is a gathering of float planes and amphibians on (surprisingly enough) Clear Lake. I should note that I have no idea why this lake is so named because the green weed that lined the shore and got bound up on anything entering the water was anything but clear.

I was writing up a piece for GAR and the article can be seen at the following link. http://www.globalaviationresource.com/v2/2014/10/09/aviation-event-review-clearlake-splash-in-2014/. There are plenty more images from the day there. The ones here are just a sample of the day. My friend Eric took his plane there and was the one who let me know about the day in the first place. He says it was a lot smaller than in previous years. That is a shame but it was still a fun day out. The location is very pleasant, the atmosphere relaxed and, as the day drew on, the light just got better and better. I will be back!

Straight Down the Runway

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One of the things I have been contemplating for a while is getting some shots at SFO from straight down the runway. I have been to other locations and blogged about them here and here. However, I wanted to try a view that included the runway itself. With a day free to play, I decided to explore the options.

I ended up with a spot that was reasonable. It isn’t perfect with fences and lights in the way to some extent. A parking lot between me and the runway has the double effect of being visually intrusive and also providing lots of heat haze. In truth, heat haze was a big problem while I was there. This was something I had anticipated being an issue. However, I was more interested in understanding the possibilities there so I could come back at a different time of year when heat haze is less of an issue.

Even so, as the sun got lower, the problem did reduce a lot and, of course, the lighting got a lot nicer. I am thinking a visit when the timing of the departure peak combines with the lighting is going to be in order.

One other thing that will change is that my visit occurred during the time in the summer when SFO was working on two runways and all operations were on the 28 runways. That meant I had a lot more departures coming my way than will be the case when the 01 runways are taking the majority of the departure traffic.

A380 Row

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I was on a flight home that stopped in LAX en route. I hadn’t planned anything for where I was sitting but we happened to land on the south side of the field and, being Southwest, the terminal was on the north side which meant traversing the field. This took us past the Bradley International Terminal. It was quite full as we passed with plenty of heavies. It had taken on a bit of an A380 theme so I grabbed the phone and got a few shots as we came by. Phone pictures through an airplane window may not be the best but it was what was to hand and they were hardly arranged for a great image anyway. If you like to see big planes from around the world, this will be for you. There are a couple of other visitors to LAX that day below. If not, come back in a couple of days and see if I have something better for you.

Working Bell 407

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I was heading back to the airport in Tucson to catch my flight when I came upon a Bell 407 doing some long line work with a person on the end of the line. Normally this sort of thing happens when you are nowhere close to a convenient place to stop. However, this time I was in luck. A turning was coming up and it had a great place off the road to stop. Consequently, I got to spend a bit of time watching the team training.

They were from the Arizona Department of Public Safety. I have no idea what that is and as a dodgy foreigner, I wasn’t going to ask. They were lifting a guy from the ground, holding him for a while and then depositing him back on the ground. They also landed briefly during the time I was there. I did have a flight to catch so I couldn’t hang around for too long but I was able to get a few shots of them at work before it was time to take the car back.

Since they weren’t too far away, I was able to use the 70-200mm. That also gave me some flexibility for playing with low shutter speeds. As I do in these cases when I have the time, I ramp the speed lower and lower. That way I figure I will get some sharp ones and then gradually increase the failure rate until nothing comes out sharp or, as is the case on a sunny day in the Arizona summer, I run out of apertures to slow the shutter speed any further. In this case, I had good luck throughout the range and was able to get some really nice discs for the rotors.