Tag Archives: 737-8

This is Further Away Than I Expected to See an Air Canada Max

During my brief visit to Heathrow, I got a bunch of long-haul departures and loads of single aisle types serving destinations closer in. However, I was caught off guard slightly by one 737 Max 8. It belonged to Air Canada. I’ve seen a few of those including when they were on test, but I hadn’t anticipated seeing one in the UK. However, the longer range of the Max means that Air Canada is using it serve Halifax from London. I guess that is not really much longer a flight than plenty in Europe, so it makes sense and is probably more efficient. I just didn’t expect to see one of their narrowbodies there. Given that the A321neos are now becoming so prevalent, this is likely to be a regular thing for other airlines too. JetBlue is already doing this so others will be too.

Icelandair’s Newer Jets Aren’t As Fun

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The introduction of the Max 8 jets to Icelandair’s fleet has brought their new livery to Seattle. However, the 757s are both a nicer looking jet and sometimes come with better paint jobs. The 757s will be going away so it might be time to get used to the Max fleet. Then again, Icelandair has also made the switch to the A321neo for some operations so, maybe they will paint some of them in schemes a bit like the 757s carried. In the meantime, it is something like this that we need to get used to.

What is This Max Testing?

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This 737 Max 8 was flying a few missions from BFI shortly before I left the region. At first I figured it was just another jet that, while in Ural’s colors, was likely going to another airline and needed to be repainted. However, when it taxied by me, I noticed it had an “experimental” marking on the fuselage. Then I saw that it had some instrumentation mounted in one of the windows. Apparently, it is doing something different. No idea what it is and I probably will never know.

Lovely Light if Only for One Day

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I think it is safe to say that we have had a pretty gloomy winter in the Puget Sound region. The grey and damp conditions have predominated, which shouldn’t come as a great surprise since the area is rather known for that sort of thing. However, there are occasional days when the sun has shown itself and they are all the more special when they arrive as a result of their rarity. Even better, I was able to spend some time at Boeing Field on one day when the sun appeared. It was later in the day which, of course, is beneficial from the point of view of getting the better light. The flow was southerly, which is not the best since it is only sky-based shots rather than something with a background but, in the middle of winter, beggars can’t be choosers. Whether it was a Boeing Max on test of a Cirrus Vision, they looked great in the soft winter light.

Let’s Experiment with Silly Shutter Speeds

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I have mentioned this in previous posts but the frame rate capabilities of my R3s have encouraged me to play around with some more aggressive settings. When something is a more important subject and not something I want to risk failing to get, I will be more cautious but there are plenty of other planes that I wouldn’t otherwise care about that provide a good subject to be a bit more ridiculous with. I was going down to 1/50^th of a second shutter speed. With this, I would go to the 30fps setting on the frame rate or even, occasionally, the 194fps setting just to see what might yield a sharp shot. The parallax issues are going to be an issue at this shutter speed but when you are directly abeam, you can get a good outcome. Here are some of the results from experimenting.

Malaysian Max Departure

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A simple post today of a plane taking off. Nothing too special about this one. Just a regular Max 8 heading to Malaysia. Since it was a delivery flight, I knew the jet would be a bit heavier and would have a longer takeoff run. I was hopeful of rotation in a good place for me to get some shots. It didn’t disappoint. I do like the livery on these latest jets for Malaysian Airlines.

A Pair of Max Delivery Flights

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At the rate Boeing is building 737s at the moment (the actual rate rather than the one that they would like to be building at) means a delivery on any giving day is a possibility. I happened to be there when two deliveries went out in close succession. The nice thing about deliveries is that the planes are usually a lot heavier as they are fueled for a longer flight. When they are departing to the south, that means that they will rotate a lot further along the runway so will be easier to photograph.

Two airlines were taking delivery on this day. One was Lion Air for its Batik Air subsidiary. The other was COPA. The light wasn’t great for either of them but sometimes the dark skies make for a more interesting background provided the light on the aircraft is not terrible. I did okay on this occasion. I have been making better use of the processing capabilities of Lightroom since they introduced the more advanced masking functions so that certainly helps.

Flying With Flair

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Canada has had a surge in low cost airlines. One of them is Flair. They too delivery of a few new jets but I never happened to be around when any of them was on test so, I never got a shot of their pretty bright colors. Another delivery was due recently and I happened to be at BFI when the jet was being ferried in from another location – presumably where it had been painted. Not the greatest light I’m afraid but still enough to be worthwhile and the colors are a bit more interesting that the usual. I’ve no idea how their operations are going but, with so many new players in the market, they will have their work cut out for them.

Embargoed Jets Finding New Homes

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The sanctions that have been imposed on Russia and Belarus have meant that any jets that were destined for them can no longer be delivered. Consequently, Boeing has been looking to find new homes for them with other airlines. After the downturn in the industry that resulted from the pandemic, there has been a surge in short haul traffic which means that narrow body jets are in demand. Boeing apparently hasn’t had a problem placing the jets since there are airlines that are desperate for new aircraft.

Turkish Airlines is taking some jets that were destined for S7. They are currently still painted in the lime green colors of S7 but the name of the airline and the logo on the fin (excluding the rudder which is harder to paint given the need to balance it) have been painted over and the new registration is applied for testing. I don’t know whether a full repaint will happen before delivery or if the airline will take care of that. I also don’t know about the interior.

Belavia was also due to take a jet and, while there is nothing apparent on the outside to say where it is going, the tracking websites are already showing it as heading to Correndon. Same story in that I don’t know what it will look like when it is handed over but they should be in service soon.

Singapore Airlines Max Delivery

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Singapore Airlines has been taking delivery of a bunch of 737 Max8 jets. These were bought by the Silk Air subsidiary but, after the order was place, Singapore decided to integrate that subsidiary into the main airline. Plenty of the aircraft had been painted before this decision was made and I guess Boeing’s price to repaint the jets was higher than the other options available so they were delivered in the old colors and then repainted after delivery. However, more recent jets have been painted in Singapore’s colors from new. 737 deliveries usually happen from Boeing Field but, for some reason, this jet was delivered from Paine Field. The sun popped out as it lined up to depart for Hawaii where it would stop en route. Not often you get an airline flight between Paine Field and Hawaii!