Earlier today Lufthansa’s D-ABYA, a 747-8i, took to the skies for a tour of Germany as she showed off the airline’s new livery design.   After her 9 hour showcase, which included stops or touch and goes at a variety of German airports, she returned to Frankfurt at approximately 5p local time.   Once again, Frankfurt Airport provided an ‘all access’ experience so that I could capture her return.

Unfortunately, the best light of the day was gone, and what was a beautiful day at the beginning, became a hazy and overcast one by sunset.   It was one of the very few things that we actually did not have control of today.

After touchdown, the unexpected bonus came in the form of being able to follow D-ABYA as she taxied off the runway and to her parking spot on the ramp before shutting down for the evening.   It amounted to a fairly high speed chase as we tried to keep up, though she did stop a few times to pose for the perfect photo.   Never before, and perhaps never again, will I be in the kind of position that I was today when it comes to photographing aircraft, so I took full advantage.

Tomorrow, I step aboard D-ABYA for her flight to New York’s JFK along with a Lufthansa crew that will be hosting a ‘Flying Lab’ during the flight that will highlight the new look of the livery as well as go into detail on enhancements that are taking place inside Lufthansa aircraft this year.   You can tune in to the event and watch it live on Lufthansa’s Facebook book page.   The flight is LH400 departing at 10:50a from Frankfurt.

Here’s how the day came to an end….