I had been disappointed by a Kalitta 727 that had come into Boeing Field during the day when I was unable to see it.  I was heading home from meetings south of the city and stopped by to see if it was leaving that evening and they almost did and then had a technical issue.  I had to get home so missed it.  I was, therefore, rather pleased when I saw it was coming to Paine Field a little while later.  It was due to arrive early in the evening.

The 727s are rare beasts these days but Kalitta has been picking up more and more 737s so you have to wonder how long the 727s will be around.  My enthusiasm was tempered a bit when I saw that the previous leg had been a few hours late so the planned arrival time was not realistic.  Instead, once it got airborne, it was due in around 9pm.  Sunset was 9:12 so this would be tight for time and would require the weather to cooperate.

I had dinner with Nancy, and we hung out for a while at which point I had to make the call.  Would I go up to Everett or not.  The weather looked okay where we are, but you never know what it will be like further up towards the coast.  At that time of the evening, it is a quick run so I figured I would just see how things looked.  As it turned out, the weather was pretty clear, and they made good time and a pretty direct approach.  As the three-holed beast came down the approach, there was low sun illuminating it.

I then headed around to the terminal to see if I could get a shot of them unloading.  The sun was now setting so the sky was glowing behind the jet as the crew worked to offload the cargo.  The fuselage was in deep shadow, but I used some HDR bracketing to give me options to work with.  Overall, it couldn’t have gone better.  They were looking for a quick turnaround and return to Michigan, but I knew it would be dark by then so headed home.  I actually heard it climb out over us just after I had got into bed!