Tag Archives: Los Angeles

Wamos – A New Airline for Me

There are many airlines around the world so plenty that you probably haven’t heard of and may never see. Finding one in your backyard is a surprise though. There I was hovering over LAX in a Robinson shooting pictures of the arriving and departing jets and a 747-400 appears on the approach. Since they are becoming fewer and further between these days, this was a good thing. When I saw the name on it, I had no idea what it was.

Wamos is apparently a Spanish airline. They have been operating some flights to LA but, up until this point (and the subsequent research I did), I had never heard of them. I guess we just never crossed paths. A new airline and a 747 was a pretty sweet combination. I was definitely on a roll on this flight as I got a number of treats.

Tahiti Nui Comes Up Trumps

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A favorite airline of mine is Air Tahiti Nui. I have never flown with them but they have a colorful livery and they still fly Airbus A340-300s so they get points from me on two fronts. The only place I ever get to see them is at LAX. Normally they operate off the southern runway complex and I saw a couple on the ground while I was there on a recent trip. While I was doing my flight over the airport to photograph operations, I knew the timing was right for one of their flights to come in. However, things were pretty busy that day and we were reluctant to move over to the southside to get them arriving as we feared we might not get back into the center area to shoot arrivals on the northside again.

I was resigned to not getting them when my lucked took a very positive turn. For some reason, and I don’t know what it was, the controllers brought them in to the north runways. They came to me! I didn’t have to do anything to reposition and I hadn’t even been aware at first that they were coming that side. Needless to say, when they appeared on final, I was pretty stoked. I imagine these jets will be replaced before too long so I was delighted to get these shots of them airborne.

BB-8 to Add to the ANA Star Wars Collection

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Back when we lived in California, I saw the Star Wars 787 from All Nippon come in to San Jose. That is the topic of this blog post. There are a couple of other Star Wars planes that ANA painted up. One is a 767 and it tends to fly around Asia so I doubt I will get a chance to see it any time soon. The other was a 777-330ER painted up like BB-8. I few of my friends have seen it come in to Chicago but I had not seen it up close. They didn’t operate in to where I was. (I had shot it overflying me at high altitude once though.)

Then I caught a break. I didn’t realize this at the time but it was operating to Los Angeles the day I was shooting over the airport. I knew an ANA 777 was on its way in but I had not paid too much attention to which aircraft it was. As I was hanging over the airport, I picked the jet out of the murky skies as it came down the approach and, as it got closer, I realized which jet it was. I have to admit, I was rather surprised and a bit excited when I saw it.

The Start of a New Stadium

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NFL fans in a couple of cities are still mourning the loss of their teams to Los Angeles. With the Rams and the Chargers both now based in LA, a new stadium is being built to accommodate them. Meanwhile, they are playing in existing stadiums. The new stadium, when it is finished, will be one of the most extravagant designs and will be used for other tasks including the future Olympics. Right now, construction work is underway. I saw the work site from my plane as I came in to LAX but didn’t have the camera to hand. However, when flying above LAX in the helicopter, I was able to get some shots at a bit of a distance of the work in progress.

Korean A330 Aiming for the Keys

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After watching a few aircraft making their approaches, you get a feel for how high the jets will be at a given point. Any variation from this seems pretty different, even if it is not really that large. A Korean Air A330 made its approach and it seemed noticeably lower to me. There was a displaced threshold in operation so maybe they were aiming a bit closer to the piano keys than normal. They didn’t do anything untoward but it did catch my attention.

Aeromexico 787

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A little trip back to an earlier photo trip for this one. Aeromexico have lots of flights to the US but their LAX flight is obviously busy enough to justify a bigger jet. That is the 787. I got to see their 787 during my visit including some great views from the helicopter that we shot from over the airport. Above is a good angle to shoot the 787 from. The wing planform is pretty distinctive and so looking down you can see that most clearly.

Shots from the Flightpath Museum

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On the south side of Los Angeles International Airport is the Flightpath Museum. Charting the history of the airport, it has many artifacts that show how the airport and the airlines that serve it have developed. It also has a terrace area. You can’t be out there without someone being aware of you and what you are doing because you have access to a live ramp area but you can get some good views of the operations in the southern runway complex. Whether it is the arriving aircraft or those taking off, it is a great spot to be to watch what is going on.

There is plenty to see. Off to one side is the freight ramp. You can see some of the freighters loading and unloading before they continue on their way. The arriving jets land a bit away from you but you have a good view of them as they roll out. The departing jets get airborne very close to or a little before you. This provides a different perspective on the aircraft to that you can normally achieve. No fencing in the way. Not too much distance. It is definitely something to check out if you are visiting LAX.

Cathay Pacific 747-8F Freighter

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I saw this Cathay Pacific 747-8F making an approach to the opposite side of the airport at LAX while I was waiting for a friend’s flight to arrive. The freighters tend to use the southerly runways since that is where the freight area is located and it cuts down on taxi requirements. Therefore, I wasn’t surprised that it went that way. Later in the day I was up on Imperial Hill when it made its departure. I was actually having something to eat and not really paying attention. It had rotated before I even realized so grabbed the camera quickly to get some shots. I’m glad the camera was close by or I would have been really annoyed.

Cathay Pacific Go-Around

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You don’t see a lot of go-arounds at major airports but they do happen. I was down at LAX awaiting the arrival of a friend when a Cathay Pacific 777 came on to the approach. As I looked back at it, the approach did not appear to be too stable. It seemed to start off a little high, then it got back on glide path but it adopted a rather nose high attitude. At this point I thought something seemed amiss but it then resumed a more normal approach angle and I figured they had got it under control. It was at this time that they powered up and climbed away.

They were tucking up the gear as they came across the top of me. They flew the missed approach procedure and then came around for a second go which went fine this time. I don’t know what the issue was but I did talk to some other pilots that had flown the approach that day and they mentioned that construction work was underway that had meant some of the approach aids were out of service. Maybe this was a factor. Since airlines have strict procedures about going around if they are not stabilized by a certain point, maybe they were just too late getting it back and stable and had to follow the procedure.

Those That Sneaked In

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I learned something significant while shooting the airliners from above LAX. It is a lot harder to see an airliner from above than I thought. In the many years of flying, I am familiar with the importance of maintaining a good lookout and the difficulty of spotting other aircraft around you in the sky. From our locations over the airport, we were generally picking out the aircraft from a background of the city, not the sky. I had figured that we knew the approach paths and what was due in so we would not have trouble seeing the planes as they came in.

I was very wrong. First, they are not easy to find at all. Three sets of eyes were looking but we would find things at odd times, sometimes when they were very close. Also, with parallel operations to the 24 and 25 complexes, you can get distracted by activity on one side and miss out on something the other side. The result of this was that we did not see some of the jets until they were on the ground. Pete, who was with me, flies 777s so we were keen to get the BA jet when it came in. We knew the arrival time and still managed to miss it until it was on the ground. An Air France A380 also sneaked in past our “diligent” scan. An Aeroflot A330 was also successful in coming in untouched.

All of these were a little frustrating but not terrible. However, it did give me pause for thought about how I would plan the flight the next time in order to keep track of the things that I most wanted to get. This flight was my first time trying this so I was happy to have got so many shots that I like. The missed ones are not the end of the world. I did learn a lot though and will make sure I use that knowledge next time.