There is no shortage of DHC Beavers in the PNW, even of the turbine variety. Plenty of them are on floats, too, so even that doesn’t make it particularly special. However, when you haven’t been able to shoot much aviation for a long time, one is a welcome sight. Even better when it switches to the closer runway when on approach.
Boeing has been building and testing 737 Max jets throughout the grounding so having them flying is not a great surprise. However, with the grounding order lifted by the FAA, things are moving into a higher gear. United took delivery of a jet and American Airlines has indicated it will start service before the end of the year. Two jets were up on the same day which leads me to think that they have already undergone the mod programs and are being tested prior to delivery to the airline.
The arrival of the balloon in Woodinville resulted in a previous post of the balloon flying in and another of the crew once the balloon was on the ground. I didn’t just shoot stills during the post landing time, though. I also decided to get a little video of the process of deflating the balloon. I was surprised how long it took but, while there is a large vent on the top of the balloon, once the envelope is lying on its side, the vent is no longer at the top and the air needs to be squeezed out. Here is the video I put together.
Late in the day in the PNW, you can get lucky with good lighting. It is not unusual to have a crappy day end with the sun, low on the horizon, cutting under the clouds and providing some briefly great conditions. With a Dornier 328Jet due in, I was hoping that the conditions might be just what I wanted. However, the plane was delayed from its planned time. At the scheduled arrival time, conditions were, in fact, rather good. I got something arriving then that looked pretty cool and will get its own post.
However, my 328Jet was running late. I kept my eye on the horizon, hoping the sun would make an appearance but the thick cloud layer hanging on the horizon told me that things were not going to work out. Sure enough, when the 328Jet showed up, the sky was decidedly dull. This was all the more annoying given that it had a really nice color scheme. They aren’t exactly rare but they are not common enough to ignore the chance to get one so this still counts as a plus for me.
Winter in the PNW does not mean reliable conditions for photographing planes. If the weather is bad, you might decide it isn’t worth going out. If it is raining and threatening to rain harder, there is a strong possibility you would skip a shot opportunity. However, 727s are getting pretty rare these days so that seems worthy of a trip out.
The weather was unpleasant when it made its approach but not as bad as it got a short while later. I went with my normal approach for shooting in really bad conditions by pushing the overexposure pretty high. I include a couple of edits. For the main image, I actually blended two different process versions in Photoshop to get the combination that most reflects how the shot looked through the view finder. The other edit is a straightforward Lightroom edit where the angle and the light suited it.
While Boeing has delayed the entry to service date of the 777X, they have continued to produce airframes at Everett with the result being a number of stored airframes on the field. There are four jets in the test program and the rest are not going to fly until certification is close so, for now, they are finding spaces across the airport for them. Some are on the Boeing flight test ramp (with production of the other widebodies ramping down, space is more available I guess) while others are on the cross runway. This has been home to 787s and 737 Max jets over the years and now it is the turn of the 777X. Some of them are identifiable by the paint on the folded wing tips while others are unmarked for now.
For the second time this year, I was at Paine Field when an Omni Air International 767 showed up. I wrote about the first time in this post. On this occasion, it arrived in some quite blustery conditions but, as it was on final approach, a gap in the clouds opened up and provided some lovely light on the airframe while leaving the background dark and cloudy. It makes for a far more interesting shot that would otherwise be the case on a day like that.
This Southwest 737-700 was completing a test flight at Paine Field. The crosswind was pretty strong so the pilot used the wing down approach to handling the crosswind. They touched down on the starboard gear and bounced a bit before settling those wheels on the surface. A short while later, they rolled wings level and the port gear made contact. Aside from the bounce, a pretty good example of landing in a crosswind in a big jet.
I talked about a Janet 737 coming in to Paine Field in this recent post. A couple of minutes ahead of it was the arrival of a Falcon 2000. The conditions were very blustery and the Falcon was bouncing around on final approach. It got quite a wing drop at one point and I did get a shot as it recovered but not showing quite how much it had rolled at its peak. As for the Janet, conditions were not great for lighting but it was not too bad.
I was pondering what to do with a day off. I was struggling to come up with a plan and the weather was not ideal for photography but I then saw that not one but two HondaJets were due in to Boeing Field within an hour of each other. I have only shot one flying before and it was very distant so I figured this would be the motivation to get me out.
The sky was very overcast with a grey background that made me hope for planes painted in an interesting color scheme. Unfortunately, both jets were in Honda schemes with grey as the main paint so they were hardly ideal for shooting in such conditions. However, I didn’t have much of a choice so I got both of them on the approach. If only one of them could have been a bit more colorful.
As I was heading off to my next stop, I drove past the Kenmore ramp and saw that one of them was parked up there. A quick diversion in and I added a ground shot of one of the jets. Not sure where the other one was parked but I would assume it was on Modern’s ramp.
