Category Archives: civil

Museum of Flight

The end of the field trip for the ISAP Symposium was a visit to the Museum of Flight. Located at Boeing Field, this is a great museum and worth a visit whether you are an aviation nut or not. It has an impressive collection of aircraft and they are nicely displayed. Inside are some impressive machines including the always attractive M-12, a variant of the Blackbird family that was intended to launch high speed drones (a program that was not ultimately successful and was cancelled).

Outside is a further selection of great airframes including a British Airways Concorde, the prototype Boeing 747, a Boeing 727 in American Airlines colors and a NASA Boeing 737 which may (or may not) be a prototype. There are others too but these stand out. They also have a Space Shuttle crew trainer which, since it is not an original orbiter, is actually more accessible to the visitors. It was not a long visit so we had to move pretty quickly to get around but a good time nonetheless.

Under Your Nose at King County

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Hayman and I had a few hours to kill after we arrived in Seattle and before we had a ferry to catch (of which more in another post). We decided to stop off at Beoing Field to have a look around. We checked out a number of places including the excellent pilot shop they have and ended up near the end of the runway. I had looked at this location on a previous visit but not shot there. A 737 was up on a test flight and due in soon so we decided to hang around.

Before the 737 appeared, we did have a couple of corporate jets show up. Identifying them from underneath is a little hard to do, even for those of us with far too familiar a knowledge of this things. However, I was more interested in getting a slightly different shot from underneath. With power lines nearby, there was a relatively short period of time in which you could get a clear shot.

The 737 showed up shortly afterwards. We did get to shoot it as it passed overhead but I did remember to stop shooting at one point and just look. The view through a wide lens tends to make everything look small. However, having something the size of a 737 right over your head is very impressive and you need to stop taking pictures and just have a look every once in a while.

Merchandise Mart

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I know what you are thinking. It has been a long time and no helicopter photos Rob! You are right, it has been too long. Fortunately, I can rectify the situation. The good people at Midwest Helicopters had a very intensive project recently. The Merchandise Mart in Chicago was the project in question. They are installing a series of new chiller units on the roof of the building. These are big units – too large for the Midwest helicopters to lift as it happens. However, before they go up, there is plenty of work to be done.

Big chiller units need to be mounted to something and getting the structural steelwork up on the roof is no small task. It needed over 180 lifts to complete the job. It was planned for two possible days with the whole day being booked for each occasion to maximize what could be done. Flying the helicopter all day was intensive for the aircraft and required two pilots to alternate in order to avoid getting exhausted.

I got myself up on to the roof of the Mart for the job. The Mart is a huge building. It used to be the largest floor space building in the world before the Pentagon was built. It might still be second (and, if I was diligent, I could probably look that up to confirm it but we know that isn’t happening while I am in mid-story). The roof is a big space and there were two separate areas where work was going to be done.

Mounting points on the roof had been installed in advance. The task on the day was to lift each piece of steel to the roof and bolt it into place. The next would follow and the frameworks for mounting the chillers would gradually come into place as the ironworkers bolted each new piece to the previous pieces. (The chillers will follow in a few weeks when Construction Helicopters come to town and I hope to cover that too.) Each pick went pretty quickly. As the new piece came into place, the guys on the roof grabbed it and bolted it into place.

The line would be released and the helicopter would go down for the next piece while the guys finished bolting the piece into place and preparing for the next section. This was a continuous process as long as the helicopter had fuel. Given how warm and sunny it was, the black-painted roof was a hot place to be and the guys were working hard. I was glad to only be photographing the whole thing!

After the helicopter left for the first refueling, I headed down from the roof. I had other things to be done that day and headed off. My original plan had been to get some shots from the ground on the second day. A lot of the steel was being stored on a barge on the river so getting some shots of that being lifted to the roof was the plan.

However, the team was super-efficient and completed the whole job in the one day. This was a great success for them and, while they were exhausted at the end of it, I am sure they were very pleased with the result. Unfortunately, with no second day, I missed out on getting the other shots I had planned. Oh well, there is always another day.

Sunset Above the Clouds

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As the spring moves closer to summer, the view on my flights home changes. The timing is not any different but I get further east before the sun gives up and disappears. Arriving in the light is not far off now but I am still getting to experience the sunset while airborne. Sometimes it doesn’t appear to be very interesting. I guess this is a function of where the clouds are relative to us. However, one recent trip included a very nice looking sky. Looking back across the wing, I could just make out the sun going down.

The light on the top of the clouds looks particularly nice from above. Sadly it is one of those events where I am disappointed that the image can’t replicate exactly how it felt to be looking out. However, maybe it will give you a small example of how it looked or, if you have seen the same thing yourself, remind you of how nice it looks.

Ameriflight

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Not a company that I was previously familiar with, Ameriflight seems to have a significant operation at Boeing Field. I assume they are a feeder to some of the larger parcels businesses that operate out of there bringing in and distributing out the packages to smaller locations that don’t have the need for something the size of a 757. They operate a mix of turboprop types.

Beech see to be a popular choice. They had Beech 99s, King Air 200s and Beech 1900 airliners operating at various points, all seeming to have been converted for cargo business. In addition, they had some Metroliners – a type that you don’t get to see so often these days.

Flightware suggested they also had Brasilias but I didn’t get to see one while I was there so whether that is true or one of Flightaware’s not infrequent errors, I don’t know. Sadly, as color schemes go, they are not terribly distinctive but it was still nice to see a selection of different types in a very short space of time. I imagine they have a window of deliveries and pick ups so timing was everything.

Boeing 737s In Progress

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While there might be changes afoot in Boeing’s production locations, Seattle is still the heart of what they build. A short distance from Boeing Field is Renton, the home of 737 production. However, the plant at Renton is an assembly facility as much as a production location and, while they do build chunks of the aircraft there, a substantial portion is made elsewhere.

Most notable of the parts coming from other places is the fuselage. Boeing used to own a plant in Wichita that builds the fuselages but they sold it a few years back and it now goes by the name of Spirit. The production of the fuselages is still done there under sub-contract and the finished fuselages are shipped to Renton by train. The train comes along the tracks right behind Boeing Field. Earlier in my visit I had been driving when a train with a couple of fuselages on it went by. I was pretty annoyed to have missed it. However, I would get lucky when another train with several more fuselages on board came by.

Supposedly the journey across is not always trouble free. There is no issue with the length of the fuselage. However, some of the residents along the route are not as concerned with the well-being of an expensive piece of airplane. Repairs are often required after they arrive including patching the occasional gun shots. I guess those people are not planning on flying on the plane any time soon or maybe they might be a little less cavalier!

Biz Jets Too!

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I am always partial to a corporate jet or two. Since Boeing Field is closer to downtown Seattle, it is a popular base of operations. There are a couple of FBOs on the field and a few movements took place while I was there. While the end of the line has come for the Hawker business jet as far as production is concerned, there are a huge number of them in service so seeing them will be common for many years to come. A nice Canadian example came in while I was there.

A departing Falcon 2000 was another nice one to see. Falcons are a very popular line and the 2000 looks okay to me but as it takes off over you, I think you get the best angle on it. There were a selection of jets departing as well. Heat haze was a small problem but not terrible and, for web sized images, it doesn’t cause too much trouble.

A Learjet came in while the sun was out but the sky in the background was a touch more moody. That certainly made me happy as it makes for a more interesting shot. It was a brief visit but still resulted in a fair bit of interest so I would happily stop back again.

Freighter Frenzy

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A recent post mentioned an evening at Boeing Field in Seattle. With nice evening light, this is a great place to shoot. Not only is the warm evening light in exactly the right diction, the field is situated at the bottom of a hill that provides a far more interesting backdrop for shots than a clear sky. Also, the variety of traffic is very good. Today, I shall focus on the bigger freighters. The airport is a base for UPS and DHL and also has a variety of other freight traffic.

With so many airlines vanishing and the variety of aircraft types diminishing, freighters provide an interesting level of diversity. First they are different operators, even if UPS and FedEx are pretty ubiquitous. Also, they tend to operate older types so aircraft that are in the twilight of their passenger careers may show up more often. This trip was not going to deliver too many exotic types with 757s and 767s still being regulars in passenger service but it won’t be too long before they start to disappear.

Irrespective, it is nice to see something a little different and to shoot them in nice light and at a nice location is even better.

Not so long ago, this would have been boring

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One evening after work I had some time to hang out at King County Airport, oath wise known as Boeing Field. In the evening light, this is a nice place to observe aviation. It has quite a variety of activity and, with quite a lot of freight activity focused later in the day, getting there after work can be productive. I shall tell more about the other movements in upcoming posts. Today is focus on one of those things that the passage of time brings. There was a Boeing 737 and I was excited by it. Why? It was a 200 series jet. For many years these were the only type of 737 around and, even when the 300 series came along, they were still very common.

As a sign of my age, I remember when the 200 series was called the “classic” compared to the newer 300-500 series jets. Now those are called classic compared to the NG jets. With the 7X, 8X and 9X coming along, will the NG now become classic and the previous two generations will need a different moniker? Anyway, 200s are not terribly common anymore so seeing one getting regular use was a nice change. It has a cargo door in the forward fuselage which, I suspect, it didn’t have earlier in its life. I hope it has a good few years left.

More SFO Activity

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The head on shots weren’t the only ones I got at SFO. Rather than go to Coyote Point, I decided to hang around by the Bay near the airport. Here you don’t get as close to the aircraft but you do get to see them land and also hope for a parallel approach or two. One problem with being further away is heat haze.

I thought I might be okay on this trip. It wasn’t particularly warm (although the sun was out) and the tide was in so, rather than mud flats between you and the planes, there was a lot of water which means less heat haze. However, I guess the power of the sun was going to win. Haze was a lot more of a problem than I expected and the shots are okay but not terribly usable.

However, it was nice to spend some time out in the sun watching planes so I can’t really complain. There were a few interesting things to see including the first JetBlue A320 fitted with Sharklets and a United 737 in a retro Continental scheme.