Mensagens

A mostrar mensagens de 2009

New Photo of the Week - Sata A310

Imagem
Haven't been these days to the aiport and been missing some interesting traffic, like yesterday's 2 Sata's A310 in a row. Anyway, a good oportunity to remember a fantastic take-off I got from one of these birds last year (and also more than time for this Week's Photo....) And some more pics of that day, for CS-TKN... Taxiing on taxiway Alpha. Entering runway 05.... ...and like I said, fantastic and powerfull take off!

Merry Christmas!!

I know that Christmas day has already passed speeding heading next year but, better late than never... Hoppe you all had some great Christmas season and keep up with spirit for the New Year. or if you prefer something more classic...

Unusual night traffic

Imagem
These last days we've had some unsuall night-stoppers at Madeira, due to weather conditions not only in Madeira but also in the rest of Europe. Last Sunday, Primera had to divert to Porto Santo and then it came a few hours later to Madeira but, probably due to flight limits of the crew it stayed for the night, departing Monday morning. Monday, Luxair arrived about 3 hours later and stayed also for the night, departing this morning. Unfortunately didn't get any night shots of these birds so, decided to share a couple of very unusual night-stoppers... The first and only time we had a KC-10 around here and it ended up staying a few more days than expected due to a technical problem. The C-130 was one of the new J versions for the US Coast Guard. As far as I know it was also the first and only time we had these around here. We had the regs. 2005 and 2006 from USCG, scales related to the presence of a USCG ship that was in Funchal port. US military traffic is more the Laj

New Photo of the Week - Christmas Week

Imagem
Christmas Week... A good pic for this week would be a spotting pic of Santa's sleigh... Unfortunatelly that's a registration I haven't caught yet.... So, meanwhile a little bit of the Christmas spirit on aviation.... You can see some more HERE This Year didn't notice many Christmas stickers or liveries...only one from Thomson but, as far as I know, hasn't come here...

Unwanteds...out of the way...

Imagem
Like I said, the day I took the panning pic had some interesting traffic. This Britannia already with Tui colors wasn't one of the most interesting although it had some diferent titles (Fritidsresor) and a funny little toon near the front door. Actually, back then, it was rather interesting as Britannia was changing its livery from the old dark blue stripes to the Tui Fly blue, which at the time was still interesting... The other point of interest here was the unusual spot that provided a photo not good for uploading to the usual plane pics sites but with a fantastic view of the lining up at runway 05...you better don't miss the turn... Anyway, some times you get some unwanteds in front of the plane, like this f#%k1ng light pole... ...but if you're really in the mood, you can allways get rid of it....LOL

Panning

Imagem
A few days ago submited this shot to a friendly Airplane Photography contest that is beeing made at Aviação Portugal , a portuguese aviation forum. The theme was pannings and this is one of my best,  and even more of an already gone airline wearing some older colors. Anyway, noticed the rest of the traffic for that day and it was quite an interesting day, specially from this perspective, a few years after.... For the next posts I'll share some of the pics of that day. For now, the panning...

Bad Weather

Well, looks like the weather yellow alert was proving right regarding the traffic at LPMA. The TP1609 just diverted to Porto Santo and it looks like the cargo plane is already there... On their way there's 3 Easyjet's and 1 TAP (besides all the other traffic after those)...lets see what will they do... Current METAR for LPMA: LPMA 151000Z 23016KT 5000 -SHRA BKN013 FEW018CB 19/17 Q1003 RERA RS23014G25KT 0523014G27KT

Top Gear S14E01

Imagem
Just seen Top Gear's first episode from the 14th season. Fantastic, as allways! But...if they liked that road in Romania, then they should try the road between Serra d'Água / Paúl da Serra / Santa, here at Madeira... It would be rather interesting to see them around....lol And yes...the Aston Martin is also my fav....

New Photo of the Week - Apache

Imagem
Last week I saw at 9G's , a Military Aviation Forum that I belong some fantastic shots of the Apache, taken by a foreign member of the Forum. Remembered this photo I took at Paris Air Show 2005. It was the first and only time I saw and photographed one of these fantastic machines live. This shot is nowhere near the fantastic pics the other member took but anyway is definitely a memory worth sharing...

Coisas de lentes....

Já tinha dado a minha 50-500 como avariada e encostado a mesma, à espera de enviá-la para o Continente, para reparação. No entanto, ontem decidi experimentar algo que ainda não tinha feito: limpeza dos contactos com spray limpa-contactos (numa cotonete). Deixei a coisa a descansar durante a noite e hoje, apesar de não ter ido ao aeroporto, fiz montes de fotos durante o dia nas mais variadas distancias focais e com as mais variadas definições de abertura, velocidade, etc... Tem funcionado a 100%... Sinceramente, não acredito que o limpa-contactos tenha resolvido nada. Estou mais inclinado para que seja qualquer coisa interna que, com os balanços do transporte deixe de fazer o devido contacto ou qualquer coisa no género mas, até ver, vou manter a lente por cá e continuando a utilizá-la.... (espero que não volte dar chatice precisamente naquele avião..."o tal" que eu queria mesmo fotografar, seja ele qual for....)

Christmas Spirit in the air

Imagem
Just a few moments ago, noticed the OO-TCJ was departing from LPMA and remembered that Thomas Cook usually puts some nice Christmas stickers on its planes during this season. Haven't really seen the plane today, so don't know if there is any sticker on this plane this year... Cheked the usual sites and didn't find any recent pics... Anyway, a good oportunity to remember the last 2 Thomas Cook planes that came to Madeira with the Christmas stickers.... One was the same OO-TCJ ... And the other, OO-TCI ...

Eyes on - My Albuns at Photobucket

Well, time for another Eyes on... This time the highlight will be of my own. Just put a slide show on the right for my photos at photobucket. You can see a full window presentation HERE It's the best way to have acess to all the pics I've published here with the tags and search option. Enjoy...

New Photo of the Week - Under the Berlin

Imagem
Last Saturday gave a ride to someone to the airport and decided that was going to wait for the Aigle Azur. When I got there, noticed that the afternoon Air Berlins (3) hadn't departed yet and the best was that 2 of them had new livery. Most of the times I see Air Berlins, they're "wearing" old (and ugly) colors... The other good news was that runway 23 was in use. It allways (almost always...) provide some great background for the afternoon take-offs. The reasons to choose this pic in particular for Photo of the Week? Well, first of all it's the last good pic I took with my Bigma....and looks like it will remain so for a while...I was having some ocasional problems with the lens but after this shot, looks like the only solution will be the repair shop...(... hope it is a solution and not a very expensive one...) Anyway looking at the bright side...it's the first time I got an Air Berlin with new livery from this position and caught the letering under t

Good bye Cagliari

Imagem
Read today at Skyliner-aviation that the D-AHFX , with the very nice South Sardinia / Cagliari livery was ferried to receive the regular Tui painting. I know that these kind of liveries are flying comercials, paid for a contracted amount of time but, in this case, is a big loss in the world of aviation liveries specially considering that the regular Tui livery is quite bad... The new Yellow/red Tuifly liverie is rather "flashing" and it isn't that bad but the regular "boring blue" Tui livery is quite awfull... Anyway...good bye Cagliari...

Rejections....

Just got THIS photo rejected at Airliners... Looks like it's not good enough for them...well...too bad, I still think it's a very nice photo and one of my best. Probably not just looking at the quality but overall, it's definitely one of my best...

Restoration Day

Imagem
Yesterday (Dec.1st) was a National Holliday. It was Restoration Day, celebrating the day we kicked the spanishes out, after 60 years under their domain. You can read some more on that HERE Anyway, took the day to relax nearby my place going in the morning for some cofee and taking my daughter to play on a nearby park. After which, the day was so beautifull that we decided to go to the Lido area. Lido is a known beach/pool complex at Funchal, nearby my place with a garden/park area around. It's a nice place for a walk or just to be there sitting and relaxing and also a nice place for kids to play around. ...and definitely weather isn't the same of the days...pretty sure that going to the beach wasn't one of the things people used to do on a December holliday....

New Photo of the Week - Flying with Sqd.502

Imagem
Like I already said, last week I attended the activation of PoAF's AM3 at Porto Santo. Besides the great oportunity to be present at such a moment, the other great thing about that was that I made my premiere on a Portuguese Air Force C-295, the new transport plane of our Air Force. We made the Madeira - Porto Santo - Madeira flights in it. It was really a great experience and although at first we didn't get too keen of photographing through the bubbled windows due to distortion, it allowed quite some fantastic and diferent shots, like this photo. On arrival to Porto Santo, we made a couple o passes over the island to shoot some images on the military instalations, the AM3. (great views!!) This pic was taken in the approach to the second pass over the runway. It's a shot with a lot of luck in the mix that gets the main elements of the island: the big golden sand beach, the runway and the small city of "Vila Baleira" with its old pier. Later on, i'll

Raven Team no Operacional.pt

O site Operacional.pt publicou mais uma excelente reportagem, desta feita relativa à Unidade de Protecção de Força, da Força Aérea, fazendo uma pequena resenha histórica sobre a mesma e dando especial destaque à operação desta Força mais recentemente, no Afeganistão, em acompanhamento aos destacamentos da Esq.501. Ver em: Operacional.pt - Afeganistão: Unidade de Protecção da Força em Operações

AM3 / Baptismo de voo em C-295

Imagem
A passada quarta-feira foi um dia fantástico! Tive a oportunidade de marcar presença no evento de activação do Aeródromo de Manobra nº3, no Porto Santo (área militar do aeroporto do Porto Santo). Além da satisfação de estar presente num pequeno momento da história da aviação no nosso arquipélago, ainda por cima num específico da aviação militar, para a qual vão as minhas preferências mas, que infelizmente, é pouco comum por estes lados, ainda tive o prazer de efectuar os voos Madeira-Porto Santo-Madeira no mais recente avião da Força Aérea, o C-295. Neste momento ainda só tratei algumas fotos mas já fiz um pequeno report noticioso para o site da Madeira Spotters, acompanhado de algumas imagens, referente ao evento e às "novidades" que pudemos confirmar por lá, no que toca ao futuro do AM3 e das aeronaves da Força Aérea que por lá andarão. Podem vê-lo AQUI, no site da Madeira Spotters . Por agora, deixo apenas uma imagem, que deverá ter sido das mais interessantes que

New Photo of the Week - Sdq.501 C130 - Porto Santo 2009

Imagem
It's been quite a while since I last looked at the pics I took this year at Porto Santo, during summer vacations. So, this Week's Photo is dedicated to Sqr.501 C-130 during that time. They were around more than usual due to the visit of the Kings of Spain to our archipelago. The most used was 16801 but 16805 also showed up once... This Week's photo was taken early in the morning. I woke and went to Pico Castelo. The silence and light at that time (around 8 am) was really nice and it was relaxing to be there just by myself. They were getting ready to fly to Madeira, in support of the visit of the Kings of Spain. The Kings and the Portuguese President were at Madeira and were coming to lunch at Porto Santo. Also on the main apron, it was the Porto Santo based C-212. It usually stayed on the military apron... It's now a little bit of past history, as C-212 already left the PoAF detachment at Porto Santo and probably  won't return. For a plane with such an his

Breaking of Copyright....

Imagem
Yesterday, DN Portugal , a national newspaper published a report on the next-week Portuguese Air Force ceremony to upgrade the Porto Santo airport military instalations to AM3 (manouver airfield number 3). With the report, they had a photo of a couple of PoAF Merlins taxiing into the runway at Porto Santo. The problem is that the photo in question is mine. They never asked any kind of permission, nor paid anything on the usage of the photo. It's copyright breaking , and it's specially worst if you consider that they're a national newspaper and that they have a huge disclamer on their copyrights and the usage of their things.... The image was originaly uploaded to Airliners.net, you can see it HERE . There, the statements regarding copyright, are pretty clear. I usually say, I do plane spotting for the pleasure of the hobby but photographic equipment and gasoline costs money and if some comercial company is making money with my work then it's more than fare th

The night the Alouette flew into the Fórum

Imagem
Some days ago, I found this pics while navigating through old photos. Thought that it really deserved to be shared, if not for the pics quality, at least for the event. It's not everyday you get to see an Alouette II at Madeira, and even less you get to see it on a "night flight"...hehe! The year: 2006. The event: A military exhibit at the Fórum Madeira Shopping. Had the info that an Al.II would be present in the exhibit and had the schedule of its arrival on the day before its opening. It was late, as the exhibit was beeing mounted after the closing of the shopping center. Anyway was well worth it. I'm pretty sure it was the first (and only) time we had an Alouette II at Madeira. It arrived on a tow truck, the surrunding area provided some nice backgrounds (although the sprinklers on the grass didn't help at all on the positions to photograph....) The military personal was nice and allowed me some close-up shots, in this case on top of the tow, r

Music... Oldie

Was just listening to some oldies and decided to share this one, one of my favs. (both the music and the vídeo)

New Photo of the Week - First A380

Imagem
With the news of the first A380 for Air France, decided to share as this week's Photo of the Week a memorie of the first (and only) ocasion I saw the A380 live. It was back in 2005, in the Paris Air Show at Le Bourget . Definitely the star of the Air Show, the teste plane was beeing seen for the first time on an Air Show. We (Madeira Spotters) stayed really near the bird and what a sight... (although I remembered thinking I was expecting something more "outstanding" when it was on the ground) But in the air....really honours it registration (F-)WWOW!! For now, only this pic, will share some others later altough made some really bad shots due to inexperiency...

Nov.9th - New Colors, Winglets and others...

Imagem
On this Monday wasn't feeling much in the mood for going to the airport but then I noticed that one of the Thomson flights from Manchester was beeing made by G-OOBA, which had changed very recently its colors from the First Choice livery for the Thomson and also had gained winglets. The Cimber Sterling flight was also beeing made by the OY-MRG, with new livery, so decided to go to the airport. Despite beeing sunny at Funchal, the weather at Santa Cruz was quite crappy, cloudy and with light rain... Anyway, the pics... This Thomson, like I said, was the star of the morning but it still is a bit disapointing, until now I was expecting that Thomson Airways got some really nice and different livery but looks like it's confirmed they'll keep TUI's "boring blue"... The winglets look real nice on the plane, though... and the colors are quite darker than the ones in use by the "old" planes. This was the other nice catch of the day. Love this livery,

Luxair

Imagem
Jorge called my atention today on a new plane to Luxair ( info on Skyliner Aviation ), so in lack of new traffic (still processing the pics from last monday, with a couple of nice catches, specially G-OOBA, with new colors, Thomson ones, and winglets...) decided to share some Luxair pics, remembering old and new colors... The next two are definitely my favorites on this airline: Taking off from runway 23, in the afternoon... Landing on runway 23, on the afternoon... Taking off from runway 23 in bad weather...This is the only pic I have published on paper for this airline: Still old colors and another take off from runway 23 on the late afternoon... New colors landing on runway 05 by the afternoon... and taking off, from runway 05, also on the afternoon... Want to know how to get into these locations? Have a look at Madeira Spotters Webpage ...it's mostly there.