Boeing Field gets the occasional military visitors and you never know what might show up. I glanced up and saw a pair of T-38s downwind for arrival. They came in with about a minute of spacing between them. The tail codes showed them to be Beale jets. They headed to the FBO at Modern and were soon being refueled. The canopies stayed up so they may have been heading out again a while later but I had to move on so I didn’t get to see them depart.
This hydroplane was due to compete at Oak Harbor. They pulled off the jetty and headed towards the track but, for some reason, they broke down. They were left drifting just outside the jetty for a while. The driver climbed out of the cockpit and was left to wait for a tow to come along. It took a while for a boat to come to their aid. They weren’t drifting fast but they were slowly heading away from the shore and towards the course. They were taken care of long before they got anywhere risky, though.
The Lynx was a favorite helicopter of mine in my teens. It was in service with both the Royal Navy and the British Army in substantial numbers. We used to see them a lot as they often flew past our home on the seafront in Cowes moving between the Navy bases at Portland and Portsmouth. The Lynx has gone from UK service, replaced by the Wildcat. I hadn’t seen any Wildcats before RIAT so was glad to see them from both the Army and the Navy (not that they look that different unliked their predecessors). Old style Lynxes were still represented though. The German Navy had an example visiting. They are not going to be around for much longer, though. They will be replaced early in the 2020s.
The north Norfolk coast is the location for Holkham Hall. We had been to the beach up there many years ago (if you have watched Shakespeare in Love, the final seen of her walking ashore on a Caribbean beach is actually Holkham) but we hadn’t visited the estate. The Hall looked like it would have been worth a bit more exploration of the estate but we only had a short time to be there. We stopped off at the entry to the estate and visited some of the buildings there. They were rather interesting looking buildings and we will go back if the opportunity arises.
While I had headed to SeaTac to see the 21Air 767 arrive, I hung around for a couple of other arrivals. Delta operates a variety of long haul types into the airport and this includes A330s of the older and newer generations. First to arrive was an A330-300. A little while later, it was followed by an A330-900, the A330neo version. I thought I would try and get identical shots of both jets to see how much the engine and winglet changes showed up when looking at them in flight. Here are shots to compare the two types for you to make your own comparisons. I think the differences are there but they are not drastic.
Twice a day at the Fort Worth stock yards, they do a drive of the long horn cattle. They take them through the street up the center of the yards with the crowds gathered around. They are very specific about where you can be. There are markers that you must stay behind and they police latecomers closely to not try and get in front of those that have been waiting. Also, you are not allowed to be low down. Crouching is not allowed. I think it might be so you can move away quickly if required.
The cowboys herd the cattle on horseback. The cattle themselves seemed pretty docile on this occasion. They are not kidding when they are called long horn cattle. The horns on these creatures are absolutely enormous. They move relatively slowly up the street so, once they had passed us and the crowd started to disperse, I was able to walk up the street quickly and get to the other end before they had all gone through.
During my weekend in Texas, I headed to Founders’ Plaza to shoot some arrivals. I timed my time there to start around the time when the Qantas A380 was due to arrive. I got there with a few minutes to spare and struggled to find a parking spot. The place was packed. I found a space in the overflow area and got the camera out just in time to get a shot of the arriving jet.
As soon as it landed, everyone started to go. A short while later, there was a backup of traffic as the cars filed out of the parking lot and away. Within ten minutes, it wasn’t deserted but it was significantly quieter. The thing is, shooting in the middle of the day was not great from a light perspective and things got progressively better as the afternoon wore on. However, most people were interested in the A380 and after that they were done.
The movement of cars around the world requires a specialist type of ship and, while they may be functionally effective, they are not good looking ships. They have the appearance of a box on the water. The large rear loading ramp allows the cars to be loaded and then they get driven around the multitude of decks for storage. This example was coming up the Solent and heading in to Southampton. A similar example had a shift of load in this area and was put aground on the Brambles Bank to avoid sinking. No issues in this case, of course.
One of the regular Volga-Dnepr AN124 flights to Everett was departing. The jet was towed out of the Boeing ramp and on to the taxiway for start up and departure. The Antonov is a big jet and its four wheel nose gear needs a special tow bar. When you are one of the largest freighters in the world, why not just take it with you. Once he plane was in place, the crew rolled the tow bar around to the rear cargo ramp. There, they hooked it to two lifting hoists and the tow bard was hoisted into the aircraft and the rear doors closed.
If someone knows whether they leave it on the hoists in flight or whether it is stowed and secured in some other location when inside, please let me know in the comments. I do like the self sufficiency of the whole approach. Given how often they come to Everett, having a tow bar on site would seem plausible but I guess they will need it at any of their other, less frequented, stops so they have to carry it all of the time. You never know where you are going next.
Our UK trip had a bit of an RNLI feel to it. We spent some time at the Bembridge lifeboat station as showed up here and here. When we got to Aldeburgh, it turned out that they also had a lifeboat station. It was quite a modern facility and very different to the Bembridge station. Bembridge has a boathouse with a slipway straight in to the water. Aldeburgh has a trailer mounted boat with a tractor unit to take it down across the shingle to the water’s edge.
The building has space for the boat on one side and the tractor on the other. There is also an inshore boat. The facility seems to be pretty modern with some nice space for the crew to keep their equipment and change when they need to go into service. It was a lot quieter than the Bembridge station with only the occasional visitor but worth a look if you happen to be on this part of the Suffolk coast.
