Tag Archives: 787-9

Out with the Old and In With the Nui

Sorry for the corny pun but I just couldn’t resist. One of my favorite airliners to shoot has been the Air Tahiti Nui A340-300. I have seen them at LAX on a number of visits. Shooting them taking off on the south complex has been possible on a few occasions and I was super lucky to get one of them landing on the north complex when I was overhead in the helicopter. The A340s are getting a bit old at this point, though, so their replacement has been ordered and it is going to be the Boeing 787-9.

One of the jets was in flight test at Everett so, with nice weather on a weekend and flying underway, I couldn’t resist a trip up to get the return. I was too late for a takeoff shot. The conditions were great. A cold snap meant that the air was clear and the sun, while it disappeared for a while shortly after I arrived, was back in plenty of time for the return. Consequently, as the plane came across the Cascades, I could see it easily prior to it turning north to come in on the approach. Mt Baker was clear in the background as they made the turn to final approach.

The dark colors of the livery make it necessary to use a bit of shadow slider when processing the shots. It was just after midday so the light was a bit on the nose of the jet but you could still get something good for the fuselage sides. The touchdown was a bit firm providing a smoky cloud of tire rubber. I wonder how much tread the airline expects to have at delivery? Often the jets will come back for a rejected takeoff run but this time they went straight back to the ramp.

Virgin Atlantic Multiple Crosses at SFO

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My last time shooting at SFO, I got shots of a Virgin Atlantic 787 arriving. Crossing shots are not unusual at SFO as the jets on approach will often have departing jets in the background. The Virgin jet had this. It also had a second crossing shot a little earlier on the approach. A jet heading over the bay to pick up the approach further down was directly behind the 787 just after it passed Coyote Point.

787th 787

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The current generation of wide body jets are being built at rates that would have been hard to imagine a few years ago. Fourteen jets a month is so much more than would have been contemplated before. That is the sort of build rate that the 787 and the A350 are achieving. The result is a lot of jets being in service not that long after the fleet first appeared. Boeing recently built the 787^th 787. It was a jet for China Southern and I got a shot of it returning to Everett. I’m glad it was an Everett jet rather than a Charleston one. I wonder who got to make that decision!

Oh Man! More New 787s

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A nice early winter sunny day is a pleasant surprise in the Pacific Northwest and I was able to head across to Everett to see what was happening. Boeing is busy building Dreamliners too though and a couple were on test flights while I was there. One was Oman Air. The scheme is an interesting change from the boring white liveries. You can certainly hear the jets as they land because the test flight involves the deployment of the Ram Air Turbine and it buzzes away when they go by. The other arrival will deserve its own post.

Gulf Air 787-9

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I caught this Gulf Air 787-9 as it returned from a test flight to Paine Field. It was at the end of the SkyFair event so the crew will have noticed that there were a lot of people on hand to witness their landing. Not a particular problem of course but probably one of the few landings of the Boeing production tests to get a large crowd.

Qantas Celebrates Aborigine Art Again

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Qantas has decorated previous aircraft with liveries that encompass aborigine art. Their Wunala Dreaming aircraft was well known around the world and, in an age when airline liveries tend to be rather bland, these colorful jets are a welcome change. They have taken a similar route with one of their new Boeing 787-9s and I saw it at Paine Field during test flying. It came in from the south and executed a go around from relatively low level.

Then they caught me out by heading north to turn and make an approach from the opposite direction. This required some rather swift repositioning by me. In fact, I got to the parking lot as they were on final approach and, rather than park, I just pulled to the side, ran up the bank, grabbed the shot and then got back in the car to park properly. It was tight but it worked out okay.

Korean Air Dreamliner on Test

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I had a couple of encounters with the same jet while it was on test. (It’s brake dust already showed up in this post.) This 787-9 is, by now, part of the Korean Air fleet. I saw it depart from Paine Field one evening in pleasant light. The low sun angle really brought out the shape of the underside of the wing in a way that normally you just don’t get to appreciate. It showed up a second time while I was out to get the farewell flight of the Delta 747 which I wrote about here. It came in at a similar time and the wet weather helped to make the pale blue color scheme pop a bit more.

Smoky Brake Dust on a New 787

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This Korean Air 787-9 Dreamliner is seen taking off one Saturday afternoon from Paine Field on a production flight test. It was lightly loaded so it was off the ground pretty rapidly and was already cleaning up the gear as it came toward me. The wheels are braked before the gear comes up to stop them spinning before they enter the bay. This can result in a burst of brake dust that blows clear in the slipstream and the shadow of the brake dust showed up clearly. As they continued the climb out, they actually lowered the gear again. I think this was to cool the brakes given they had done a high-speed taxi run prior to the takeoff.

Qantas Dreamliner Delivery

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Delivery flights from Paine Field are good news because the jets are going to be a bit heavier and will use more of the runway. This brings them closer to where you can be to photograph them. Qantas were taking their second Dreamliner and it was delivering early in the afternoon of a winter Saturday. The winter light is just so good when the clouds have parted. No harsh shadows and a low sun angle are great conditions to be shooting in. I hope the crew had a good flight. It was long enough!

Thai Delivery

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Before the time changed, it was possible to get some evening departures from Everett in nice light after work. I saw that a delivery flight was scheduled for a Thai 787 and a Dreamlifter was due out shortly afterwards. I figured this was a good one to go for. The Thai delivery actually slipped a bit from its scheduled time and I was more than happy for it to do so as the light was getting better and better. By the time the jet started rolling, the light couldn’t have been nicer. It was also a heavy jet and rotated not far from me so I got a great angle on the takeoff and, as it climbed away, the purple in the livery seemed to glow.