I know….long time no update…but to be honest I did not make much photos either. In the meanwhile I have been visiting a few bases throughout Europe for which the best one was Alicante and the worst one…Bournemouth (who wants to live there?). The lack of photos was also due to the fact that I had no camera for a while. I lost it at the airport and a month later I got it back via the airport’s lost and found department. Kudo’s to the one who was so honest to bring it back in the first place! But now I am planning to buy a new camera anyway. Not just to keep making aerial photos but also for astronomy related events.
In the meanwhile I dug out some photos made during the last two or three months. Some of them are not of very good quality because they were made with my phone during the time I had no camera available. I split this photo session in two sections. The aerial part and the technical part – for the one who like some aircraft system close and personal..
The Alps in the summer. Hardly any snow visible here..
A few nice gletchers visible probably sitting there for a few thousand years now.
The lake of Geneva which has been a news items quite a lot in the past few weeks due to the start up of the so-called Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and the fear of some ‘scientists’ of a possible apocalypse because of an accidental generation of a black hole by the LHC. Well don’t worry yet…as it already broke down due a helium leak. The LHC is located just west of the lake of Geneva.
A nice low level frontal system. As you can see the cloud layer is suddenly interrupted which generates a nice vertical wall of cloud. That’s what we a frontal system or the transitional region of two different airmasses. Photo made overhead the sea of Biscay (France).
Another photo of this frontal system
My home village photographed from an alitude of 36.000′ (11.000 m). The airport to the right is the NATO airbase Geilenkirchen.
Palermo airport (Sicily – Italy). In Italy they have the inexplicable urge to build airports next to/against mountains. Don’t ask me why…probably just because they can. Still a very nice place to be.
An now some technical photos:
This is the FMS or Flight Management Computer. This computer contains, amongst other things, the Flight plan, monitors fuel and regulates thrust and speed settings for different phases of flight. The photo above shows page 1 of the CRZ or Cruise page showing basic cruise data such as planned cruise altitude, optimum/maximum altitude, estimated fuel remaining at arrival and turbulence thrust setting advisories.
Personal control panel for your EFIS display. Settings such as type of chart, minima settings, radar and range can be set here.
The so called IRS or Inertial Reference System is a vital part needed for navigation. Together with GPS data and ADIRU input (input from probes such as air pressure, temp etc), the IRS determines the current aircraft’s position, height, speed, attitude and de/acceleration. As the word “inertial” already says, the system is determines it’s position by using input from several gyroscopes for pitch, roll and yaw. The aircraft is equipped with two IRS systems to enhance accuracy. The photo above shows the current “PPOS” or present position output given in standard longitude/latitude coordinates.
The electronics panel as we (and Boeing) call it. The left and right sides are dedicated to communications. Think about ATC communications but also the setting for the radio beacons (VOR/DME, NDB’s) and local communications between the two pilots and the flightdeck – ground and flightdeck-cabin. The middle segment contains controls for the transponder (which makes us visible on the radar screens) and controls for our onboard weather radar and the fire warning system for the cargo holds.
The controls we hope that we never have to use them: The fire warning and control system. This system monitors both engines, the APU (small third engine in the tail that generates electrical power and pneumatic power for the a/c and engine start) and the main wheel well. When a fire is detected, the related red fire handle will light up accompanied by a loud bell. By pulling on the handle we can initiate a quick shutdown procedure and by rotating it we can activate a fire bottle in an attempt to extinguish the fire. Each engine contains two fire bottles, the APU contains only one. The wheel well contains no fire bottles and fire should be extinguished by extending the landing gear.
Other visible parts are the parking brake (red light) and the two “start levers” which enables us to control the fuel valves for the engines.
The secondary engine instruments. From top to bottom we have: N2 high pressure compressor/turbine speeds, Fuel flow in x1000 kg/hour, oil pressure, oil temperature, oil quantity and engine vibration.
A part of the paperwork to be done during flight preperation and the flight itself: The flightplan. Important things such as the route (duh), weather of enroute/destination alternates as well as regular fuel checks to identify a possible fuel leak are completed on this document. It also gives valuable info about estimated high level winds and the fuel burns at each checkpoint and much more.
